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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 

Chap Copyright No._..-_- 

Shelf- ^ ^ ^ 

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 



TOWARDS 
PRETORIA 



A Record of the WAR 
between Briton and Boer 
to the Relief of Kimberley 



By Julian Ralph 

Special War Correspondent to the ^^Daily MaiP* 



With a Summary of Subsequent Events to the 
Hoisting of the British Flag at Bloemfontein 
With Historical Foreword^ Appendices and Map 



FREDERICK A. STOKES COMPANY 

PUBLISHERS 



TWO Copies received, 

n iuthf) of Geti^fdiHi 
lifUaa of t&« 

Mftv ) . 1300 

iseg!«f9r of C»pyrt5it% 



61130 

Copyright, 1899, 1900, 
By JAMES GORDON BENNETT. 



Copyright, 1900, 
By FREDERICK A. STOKES COMPANY. 



Copyright, 1900, 
By the new YORK HERALD COMPANY. 



^ 



SECOND COPY, 









/ have to thank Mr. Alfred 
Harmsworth for his courtesy in 
per7nitting me to reproduce from 
the ^^ Daily MaiV descriptions ^ 
which are here combined with other 
material to illustrate the British 
advance ^^ towards Pretoria.''^ 

As time goes on, and fresh matter 
of personal and Imperial interest is 
gathered from the field of action^ 
■further records will be prepared on 
similar lines, to carry forward and 
complete the thrilling story of the 
war in South Africa between Briton 
and Boer. 

JULIAN RALPH. 

March, 1900. 



CONTENTS 



HISTORICAL FOREWORD. 

PART I. 

rAGB 

THE DUTCH IN SOUTH AFRICA I 

PART II. 

BOER ULTIMATUM AND ARMAMENT 35 

TOWARDS PRETORIA 

CHAPTER 

I. CAPETOWN TRANSFIGURED 43 

II. SIR ALFRED MILNER^S TRIALS 49 

III. BRAVE OFFICERS AND RICH REFUGEES 55 

IV. THE BOER AT HOME 61 

V. IDLERS AND MILLIONAIRES 68 

VI. CLIMATE AND KAFFIRS 74 

VII. NATAL AND LADYSMITH 80 

VIII. AT SIR REDVERS BULLER's HEADQUARTERS 97 

IX. THE SITUATION AT DE AAR IO3 

X. HEADQUARTERS DURING A BATTLE I08 

XL BATTLE CONDITIONS ON THE VELDT II5 

XII. DUST AND KHAKI 122 

XIII. BATTLE OF BELMONT 1 29 

XIV. BOERS IN WAR I35 

XV. BATTLE OF GRASPAN 14 1 

XVI. BATTLE OF MODDER RIVER I47 

XVIL ECHOES OF MODDER RIVER , 158 

vii 



viii CONTENTS 

CHAPTER rAGB 

XVIII. FILLING tommy's WATER-BOTTLE 1 67 

xix. battle of maaghersfontein , 1 74 

xx. the mess of the wessex fusileers 1 92 

xxi. the padre and our friend the enemy 1 99 

xxii. christmas with methuen^s army. 204 

xxiil traits of modern battle 212 

xxiv. scenes and sounds of modern war. . 219 

xxv. a halt in modern war methods 228 

xxvi. correspondents under fire 236 

xxvii. an open letter to a field-cornet 249 

xxviii. the relief of kimberley 260 

xxix. record of the siege 267 

Appendices — 

I. Chief Events of the War 277 

II. Army Decorations and Promotions for Gal- 
lantry, etc., at the Seat of War 280 

III. The Commands in South Africa 282 

IV. Tables of British and Boer Ordnance.. ...... 285 

V. Official Table of Casualties 289 

VI. Glossary of Boer Terms and their EngUsh 
Equivalents, especially prepared by a 

Johannesburger for this Volume 291 

VII. The Presidents' Telegram Proposing Peace, 

and Lord Salisbury's Reply 293 

VIII. The Two Conventions 296 

IX. Lord Methuen's Report on the Battle of 

Maaghersfontein 3^2 

X. Summary of Events since the Relief of Kim- 

berley. . S^S 

Index 3^9 



HISTORICAL FOREWORD 



HISTORICAL FOREWORD 



PART I 

THE DUTCH IN SOUTH AFRICA 

South Africa, or Africa south of the Zambesi, may- 
be described in a few sentences, so that its physical 
peculiarities are revealed, and it becomes clear to the 
mind's eye that it is practically one country by nature, 
and must eventually be one by government. 

A high plateau of rolling, grass-covered land falls 
away abruptly on each sea-shore, and at the Cape or 
southernmost end, leaving a more or less swampy, 
malarial, and generally narrow margin between the 
tableland and the water. On the Indian Ocean coast 
lie Natal, and Portuguese East Africa ; and on the 
Atlantic German South-west Africa, and Portuguese 
West Africa. 

Except in Natal there are few white people in these 
states, and, whatever influence they are yet to exert 
upon the development of South Africa, they have not 
yet begun to form, or even to suggest, their own 
hereafter. 



2 HISTORICAL FOREWORD 

Of harbours there are, on the west only Capetown, 
Saldanha Bay, and Walfish Bay in German Africa — 
all English ports ; and on the east coast Durban in 
Natal, and Delagoa Bay and Beira in the Portuguese 
strip. 

South Africa displays monotonous sameness in the 
ever-recurring hills and prairies of the interior plateau. 
The only variation and relief to the eye is at the door- 
ways, so to speak. All around the coast, walling in 
the great middle tableland, are mountain ranges rising 
higher and higher, until they sometimes soar to a 
height of six thousand feet at sixty miles from the sea, 
and to more than three thousand feet at half that 
distance inland. 

In these bold ranges are to be found practically the 
only beauties of scenery which South Africa possesses. 
Basuto Land, which lies between a part of Natal and 
the Orange Free State, contains such glorious scenery 
as to have earned for it the flattering nickname of " the 
Switzerland of South Africa." 

Part of the mountainous country a little farther north, 
inland from Delagoa Bay, is also spoken of by travellers 
as very grand and beautiful ; and this is also true of 
Manica Land, between Portuguese East Africa and 
Matabeleland, in the British South African Company's 
domain. 

The English and Dutch dominions, which compose 
the great tableland, are three thousand to five thousand 



THE DUTCH IN SOUTH AFRICA 3 

feet above the sea level, so that, in spite of the latitudes 
in which they lie, they possess a temperate climate. 
Their soil is very dry, with small rainfalls, and rivers 
which are either so full as to render them useless for 
navigation, or, during the major part of the year, nearly 
dried up. 

It is an empire of rolling land, desert in part, grass- 
grown in the main — an imperial cattle range, only as 
yet touched here and there for agriculture — one region 
for one people, or, at least, for uniform laws governing 
kindred interests. 

The little pit at Kimberley on the edge of the Free 
State, where the diamonds are found, and the several 
tiny punctures in the Veldt whence the Transvaal gold 
is taken out, are of gigantic value, but are too small 
to affect the general rule that South Africa is all 
alike, a pastoral region needing water before it can be 
promoted to become a seat of agriculture. 

It is a great, dry, almost burnt land, an empire of 
soHtude and silence. It is said that though there are 
four million natives in the older colonies, the average 
traveller rarely sees anything of them, or any hint of 
them except their trails. As for the white people (of 
whom there are not a million in all these lands), their 
homes and villages are so small, and scattered so far 
apart, that they do not often intrude upon the view of 
the tourist. 

There are but two cities of important size, and half a 



4 HISTORICAL FOREWORD 

dozen of some note as capitals or seaports, in that 
entire half-continent. " A vast solitude with a few 
oases of population," is what Mr. Bryce calls it ; and 
he explains that this is because of the scanty means for 
sustaining life, and the few openings for industry 
unaided by capital, which the country offers. 

In considering this newly opened continent it will 
be less confusing, and in all respects advantageous, to 
confine the matter to the four better developed and 
more important dominions ; the Cape, and Natal, 
colonies of England, the Orange Free State, and the 
South African Republic of the Boers; calling hereafter 
the larger Boer republic " The Transvaal." 

This is in good truth only its nickname, and in 
reality means " across the Vaal," the river which divides 
the two Boer states ; but in this case the nickname has 
a character and fitness of its own, which is not to be 
found in the country's prosaic name, The South 
African Republic. 

The oldest and largest English settlement, Cape 
Colony, is more than twice as large as Great Britain, 
and has a population of seven to the square mile. It 
contains 382,cxx) white men, and a million more than 
that number of natives. Of the white people more 
than half are of Dutch descent, and the rest are Eng- 
lish. 

Natal has less than 50,000 white inhabitants, and ten 
times as many natives. It is only about one-fourteenth 



THE DUTCH IN SOUTH AFRICA 5 

the size of Cape Colony, or about twice as large as 
Wales or Massachusetts, but it is far more varied in 
soil, climate, and future possibilities than the larger 
British colony. 

The Orange Free State is rather more than a fifth of 
the size of Cape Colony, and is practically (like all 
these dominions except Natal) a great pasture land, 
with but little ground devoted to agriculture ; and it 
boasts but one important town, Bloemfontein, its very 
prepossessing capital. 

The Free State contains about 78,000 white people, 
and nearly twice as many natives — the dominant race 
being nearly all of Boer stock. 

The Transvaal is two-thirds the size of France, but 
with a population of less than a million, of whom not 
quite a quarter (245,000) are white people. The Boers 
are 65,000 strong, and hold in subjection 100,000 Brit- 
ish and 80,000 persons of other European races. 

In the main the Transvaal is pasture land which 
yields very poor, rank herbage for cattle, and its hills 
rise to such mountainous heights that it is subject to 
severe cold in winter, and fierce heat in summer. It 
presents nothing to the view which should make any 
one covet it, and is an almost treeless, wind-bothered, 
rolling prairie of greatly varying value. Until gold 
was found under its surface in 1885, the Boers, ever un- 
systematic, unorganised, and leaving all labour to the 
blacks, had only succeeded in producing a bankrupt 



6 HISTORICAL FOREWORD 

State, which cried out for help when even its black 
neighbours threatened it. 

What it has since become is due to the discovery of 
gold, a source of wealth and mischief of which the 
Boers declared that the less it was disturbed the less 
trouble it would make. Had they enforced this view 
in law and practice, and left the gold where it lay, or 
had they forbidden white- miners to work in their coun- 
try, they might have avoided the tragedy towards 
which fate has since hurried them. On the contrary, 
they left their mining resources to be developed by 
foreigners, by taxing whom as no other people on earth 
are taxed, they have made themselves temporarily 
wealthy, with that most precarious of all forms of 
wealth — the sort that is ill-gotten. 

Those German, Hollandish, and Jewish parasites 
who feed upon the Boers, and who dread the ascend- 
ancy of Anglo-Saxon methods, which would put an 
end to their milking of the Transvaal treasury, have 
tickled the ears of some sentimentalists in England, by 
making it appear that the Boers are deserving of all 
the sympathy an otection due to a heroic handful 
who, against heav} odds, have succeeded in establish- 
ing a government of their own. 

A similar secret agency in the United States, de- 
ceived the Americans with the argument that the 
Transvaal is another such country as America was 
after it had seceded from England, and began to carve 



THE DUTCH IN SOUTH AFRICA 7 

out its greatness amid the forests, and against the sav- 
ages who compassed its sturdy settlers on every hand. 

Both these pictures are grotesquely false, and quite 
misleading. The one which would make the Boer 
republic, where industrious and wealth-compelling 
foreigners are treated with contempt, appear to re- 
semble the American confederation, which has ever 
offered full and easily gained citizenship to all who ap- 
plied for it, would be criminal were there any likelihood 
of its bearing fruit in the form of active American 
sympathy. 

Before we deal with the results of President Kruger's 
defiant boast that he will " never give anything " to 
those who have strengthened the Transvaal, and made 
him a very rich man, let us examine the Boer, and 
review his history in South Africa. 

Out of the conditions of solitude and silence of 
small winnings wrung from danger and deprivation, has 
been produced the Boer — a type unknown, and in many 
ways unapproached, anywhere else, though a higher, 
finer, altogether nobler type of recluse was generated 
in the mountain regions of Virginia, Tennessee, and 
Kentucky in the American States a century ago, to 
send its best descendants to the forefront in that 
nation, and to leave its weaker ones a disappearing 
fraction of small Importance. 

The unique type which Africa has produced sprang 
from the lowliest birth in Holland, and has since retro- 



8 HISTORICAL FOREWORD 

graded beneath its own poor beginning, becoming less 
enlightened, less cleanly, less gentle, and far less amen- 
able to organisation and discipline. 

The Boer thus degraded has lost nothing in courage, 
it is generally agreed, and has made a distinct advance 
in self-reliance, strengthening his love of liberty, and 
license, and independence. The love for loneliness is 
his strangest trait. That which all other settlers in 
new lands accept as a hard necessity, but protest 
against unceasingly, the Boer still seeks, insists upon, 
and cherishes. 

The Dutch made their first South African settle- 
ment at the Cape in 1652, and six years later began to 
bring slaves from other parts, and to press into bond- 
age the natives close around them. All forms of do- 
mestic service and industrial labour they put upon 
these blacks, and thus laid a curse upon South Africa 
by making it to this day, in all the various States, 
degrading for a white man to perform manual labour. 

To these first settlers there came, thirty-seven years 
later, three hundred French Huguenots, from among 
the many who had taken refuge in Holland after the 
revocation of the Edict of Nantes. 

These new-comers were men and women of far 
greater refinement and far higher social status, of edu- 
cation and pride, fresh from participation In the fore- 
most civilising forces of their time. They endeavoured 
to live by themselves, but this effort was frustrated by 



THE DUTCH IN SOUTH AFRICA 9 

the Dutch, who, by both force and adroitness, quickly 
absorbed them. They forbade them the use of their 
mother tongue, brought them into the Dutch Church, 
scattered them among their own Dutch communities, 
and, in time, by intermarriage with them, gained some 
of the best traits which now endure in the Boer blood. 

On the invitation of the Netherlands Government 
England seized Cape Colony in 1795, and held it seven 
years, when it was restored to its original rulers. Five 
years later, the English, who had learned its value as a 
naval stronghold, seized it again — this time without 
being invited to do so — and in 18 14 had it ceded to 
them upon payment of ;^6,ooo,ooo to the Dutch 
Stadtholder. 

At this time the Dutch numbered twenty-seven 
thousand, and owned thirty thousand slaves. English 
emigrants swelled the population, and with any other 
people there would have been almost a certainty of a 
fusion of the two races, but the Boer, restive and dis- 
obedient under all rule, is antagonistic as well when 
his rulers are not of his own blood. 

Their highest aim at all times is to be under their 
own government, and then to feel as free of it as pos- 
sible, living by themselves, in widely separated house- 
holds, each dependent upon his own resources, and 
fancying himself in the especial care of the Almighty, 
whose inspired book is the only literature he knows. 
" Ignorant, prejudiced, strongly attached to tlv i/ old 



lo HISTORICAL FOREWORD 

habits, impatient of any control," is how their charac- 
ter is described by the fairest and most careful of all 
the Englishmen who have studied them and their 
history.^ 

Having forbidden the use of any language except 
the Dutch, and having re-enforced this law as soon as 
they gained nationality anew in the Transvaal, they 
were greatly incensed that English should be chosen 
as the tongue to be employed in the Cape Colony law 
courts and their documents. More keenly still did 
they resent the endeavours of the English to protect 
the natives against their proverbial cruelty. 

It was to be expected that a peasantry which had 
stagnated for two centuries would not understand or 
sympathise with the English abhorrence of slavery; 
and in fact out of this, and the Englishman's determi- 
nation to protect the natives against Boer cruelty, arose 
that hatred of the Briton which has waxed stronger in 
the Boer heart, until to-day the commonest name they 
give to an Englishman is ** rotten egg," and the po- 
litest phrase by which they differentiate him from a 
Boer is " redneck." 

They had been refractory, and at times mutinous, 
under the government of their own people. They re- 
mained so under the rule to which their own people 
handed them over, or sold them. It was in 1834 that- 
Parliament passed an Act freeing all slaves in the Brit- 
1 James Bryce in " Impressions of South Africa." 



THE DUTCH IN SOUTH AFRICA ii 

ish dominions all over the world, and thus added the 
somewhat weighty straw which broke the back of Boer 
endurance. 

The compensation granted to the slaveholders under 
the flag was inadequate, and though as much was al- 
lowed to South Africa as fell to slaveholders in other 
colonies, this fact did not serve to mitigate the added 
grievance to the Boers. Many writers grant them a 
greater or less measure of sympathy, but in absolute 
candour it must be said that this is principally based 
upon the fact that the English methods of dealing 
with the black races differed from their own, and to 
sympathise with them must necessarily be to disparage 
nineteenth century principles of justice. 

The Boers enslaved the native, and treated him 
harshly both in slavery, and in their relations with him 
in his wild state. Their cruelty was spied upon and 
reported by British missionaries, and punished by the 
Government ; then Boer quarrels and conflicts with the 
natives gained for the blacks the protection of the 
English, and finally their slaves were set free, in com- 
mon with all slaves held under the British flag. 

Upon these statements both sides agree, and it seems 
that the only sympathy we can feel for the Boers is 
that which they continue to deserve— that which be- 
longs to men of seventeenth-century ways, who find 
themselves three centuries behind the ideas and influ- 
cnces which hedge them round. 



12 HISTORICAL FOREWORD 

Had the Boers been people of noble nature, of fine 
instincts, kindly, and with high and broad aspirations, 
had they redeemed, or even made an effort to redeem, 
a great wilderness, and put it in the path along which 
the progressive nations of the globe were tending; had 
they shown due regard for education, religious liberty, 
and the dignity of white labour ; had they sought to 
produce and to manufacture what even their simple 
needs demanded, and to render themselves self-support- 
ing, very different would be the judgment of the world, 
nor would its verdict be the death-sentence which now 
seems most likely to be passed upon them. 

Had they, with all their uncouthness, been men of 
high resolve and broad capacity, the feelings which some 
seek to rouse in us on their behalf would be stirred in 
every fair man's heart. But this is so far from the case 
that all the weight of their " secret fund " has not been 
able to create the belief that they are a virtuous hand- 
ful, struggling to create a government based on lofty 
ideals ; has not been able to raise a single nation to 
speak or move upon their behalf. 

The effort to compare them with the Founders of 
the North American Republic is to belittle the intelli- 
gence of every American who has informed himself 
upon the Boers' history. The petty, squalid record of 
the Boer leaders no more matches the heroic course of 
the American patriots, than the life of Stephen John 
Paul Kruger parallels that of George Washington. 



THE DUTCH IN SOUTH AFRICA 13 

Indeed, whoever would spare himself all greater trouble, 
and still reach the same just result, can simply contrast 
the portraits of the two Fathers of their Countries, and 
feel secure in what conclusion he may draw from this 
comparison. 

Disgusted by the freeing of their slaves, the Boers 
made what they call the *' Great Trek" in 1836 into a 
new territory, which offered them an opportunity to 
lead the solitary, almost nomad lives which to-day they 
still relish as the very consummation of desire. 

The imperial spirit in full measure was not then upon 
Great Britain, nor did her rulers show that pride and 
foresight which defeated secession in the American 
States twenty-nine years later. They allowed the 
Boers to go, and, like the constable of Shakespeare's 
creation, " thanked God they were rid of a vil- 
lain." 

And so it came to pass that in the course of two 
years about ten thousand Boers made the journey 
northward and eastward in their waggons, each head 
of a family carrying his Bible and his gun, and — so 
short is this nation's history, and so quickly do events 
march — among them strode a lad who has come to be 
the President of this day, and who, on that long trek, 
may have had riveted upon his mind the extraordinary 
conviction, or hallucination, which, at the end of sixty 
years, was to lead him to defy progress, justice, and 
the principles of liberty, fraternity, and equality, while 



14 HISTORICAL FOREWORD 

boasting that he would " never give anything " to the 
majority of people under his rule. 

In the belief that they had freed themselves from 
the domination of foreigners, they began to establish 
their present republics upon the elevated plateau of 
the interior. Hardship, tragedy, wars with the natives, 
and all the vicissitudes of life in an unbroken country 
inhabited by savages, attended them, but they clung 
sturdily to their purpose. 

At nearly the same time a large and better organised 
band of Boers, led by Pieter Retief, marched into what 
is now Natal, and all that resulted there did not by any 
means serve to allay the hatred of the Boer for the 
Briton. Durban (then Port Natal) had already been 
formed by the English, but the Government refused to 
establish its rule over the new territory. 

This proved to be one of many instances of unwise 
action on the part of the Colonial Office, at the time 
when Great Britain fancied that she needed no more 
colonies, and that those which she already possessed 
should be left to struggle for themselves. 

When the Boers began to pour into Natal in 1838, a 
garrison was sent by the Cape Government to the little 
east coast port, but the Crown refused to annex the 
region, and the garrison was recalled. 

Shortly after this they made war upon the Zulus 
in Natal, established their own city of Pietermaritzburg, 
and began to parcel out the land. At once, the British 



THE DUTCH IN SOUTH AFRICA 15 

sent troops there to assert English sovereignty, and 
the Boer forces dispersed. Only five hundred remained 
in the new Colony ; the others crossed the mountains 
and joined their compatriots in the two republics. 

Thus an end was put to a third Boer republic, which 
existed only six years. 

The participants in the *' Great Trek " were now 
about fifteen thousand strong, and were attempting to 
govern a territory seven hundred miles long and three 
hundred miles wide. Great Britain had never ceased to 
regard them as her subjects, and still declared them 
such, yet did nothing to interfere with their course, 
or with the governments they set up. 

At first the Boers bound themselves by slender ties 
into many little republican communities, each of which 
had a volksraad or people's council. This was more 
especially the case in what is now the Transvaal. The 
Boers on the southern side of the Vaal River, where 
now is the Orange Free State, had no government, and 
did not recognise any of the little governments of the 
Transvaal. 

They were at last roused into nationalisation by a 
sudden movement of Great Britain, which, in pursuance 
of a plan for ensuring peace near the borders of its 
colonies, annexed the land between the northern border 
of Cape Colony and the Vaal River, and called it the 
Orange River Sovereignty. The handful of unor- 
ganized Boers rose in arms, and with the help of armed 



i6 HISTORICAL FOREWORD 

men from the Transvaal country, commanded by 
Andries Pretorius, they captured Bloemfontein from 
the British resident. They were as readily repulsed, 
however, by troops under Sir Harry Smith, and again 
their country became an English colony. 

Peace was not yet produced. War broke out 
between a negro tribe and the British authorities in the 
Orange River Sovereignty, Pretorius threatened to 
assist the Kaffirs, and, at the same time, the Cape 
colonists were at war with natives on the coast. At this 
juncture Pretorius offered to come to definite terms 
with Great Britain, and there followed the Sand River 
Convention of 1852. 

At that Convention it was agreed that Great Britain 
'' guaranteed to the emigrant farmers beyond the Vaal 
River the right to manage their own affairs, and to 
govern themselves according to their own laws, without 
any interference on the part of the British Govern- 
ment ; " the Boers, in return, promising to make no 
alliance with any of the natives north of the Vaal 
River, and to permit no slavery in their country. 

This convention gave birth to the Transvaal or South 
African Republic, which was thereafter slowly formed 
out of the little governments which had existed there. 
Accepting this, then, as the basis of the relation 
between the British and the Transvaal Boers, we see 
that Great Britain assumed the right to impose condi- 
tions, upon which she granted what rights the Boera 



THE DUTCH IN SOUTH AFRICA 17 

held, and this British overlordship was acknowledged 
by them without protest. 

A lukewarm interest in all her colonies, amounting 
to a willingness to rid herself of any that occasioned 
trouble or expense, still marked England's policy. 
Her forces in the Orange River Sovereignty met with 
reverses at the hands of the natives, and when these 
foes at last expressed a desire for peace the Govern- 
ment decided to withdraw from the colony altogether. 

The Orange River settlers were to a great extent 
British and pro-British, and many of them appealed to 
England to reconsider her policy. No attention was 
paid to them, and at a Convention at Bloemfontein in 
1854 the British guaranteed the future independence of 
the country and its government, forbade the holding of 
slaves there, and, as in the case of the Transvaal, 
offered to the new people the right to buy areas in the 
British colony, according liberal concessions in the 
matter of import duties as well. 

To the Orange Free State Great Britain gave a more 
positive declaration of independence than had been 
given to the Transvaal ; snd the Free State people, a 
far more orderly and reasonable community than the 
Transvaal Boers, long remained in unbroken peace 
with their English neighbours, in spite of an untoward 
occurrence of great moment which happened in 1869. 

The discovery of diamonds at Kimberley led to 

counter claims for the territory in which they were 

2 



i8 HISTORICAL FOREWORD 

found. The Free State claimed it, assertions of owner- 
ship were also made by the Transvaal, a native chief, 
and a Griqua half-breed named Waterboer. The arbi- 
trator agreed upon by all except the Orange Free State 
was the Governor of Natal, who, by reason of the mis- 
management of the cases for the other parties, decided 
in favour of Waterboer. Waterboer put himself under 
British protection, and the Government created a new 
colony with the territory, and called it Griqualand. 
This is now a part of Cape Colony. 

Later still, on fresh appeal, an English court decided 
that Waterboer had no rights in the case. The Orange 
Free State, which had by far the best case, did not re- 
linquish its claim, but accepted ^^90,000 in satisfaction, 
and thus the incident was closed without friction or 
lasting discontent. 

In proof that the Boers of the Free State were su- 
perior to their neighbors in the Transvaal, James Bryce 
speaks of the Transvaal Dutch as more rude and un- 
educated than those of the Free State, with no admix- 
ture of English blood, and unaffected by intercourse 
with the more civilised people of Cape Colony. 

Their love of independence was accentuated by a 
tendency to discord. Their warlike spirit had produced 
a readiness to take up arms on slight occasion, and had 
degenerated into a fondness for predatory expeditions. 
They were constantly endeavouring to extend their 
borders to the north, and one party among them even 



THE DUTCH IN SOUTH AFRICA 19 

attempted the capture of the Free State. Then came 
the Sand River Convention of 1852, already mentioned, 
and by i860 their little governments had united upon 
the basis of a common constitution called the " Groud- 
wet," or fundamental law. 

Even after this they kept up frequent and savage 
wars with the natives, which were attended by fearful 
massacres on one side and savage retaliation on the 
other. They subjected still other natives to an en- 
forced bondage hard to distinguish from slavery. They 
would pay no taxes, resorted to primitive modes of 
barter because of an almost general absence of money, 
and neither realised the capabilities of, nor benefited 
by, the makeshift they called a government. 

The treasury soon became empty, and practically 
every Boer made his own pleasure his law. During 
this condition of their affairs they engaged in a disas- 
trous war with a Kafir chief, and were threatened with 
attack by the powerful Zulus. A British commissioner 
was sent to inquire into the condition of affairs there, 
and reported that a majority of the people desired an- 
nexation to Great Britain. 

There were remonstrances and counter petitions, and 
the critics are at odds as to the justice of the British 
action, but what is undeniable is that the Boers sub- 
mitted quietly to the change, and offered no resistance 
until order had been produced out of the confusion 



20 HISTORICAL FOREWORD 

into which they had fallen. Thus, in 1877, the Trans- 
vaal was annexed to Great Britain. 

Had the attention of the Government not been dis- 
tracted by weightier affairs in Europe, the blunders 
which marked its subsequent dealings with this new 
colony could not have been made, and South Africa 
would have been thus early liberated from the heritage 
of discord, disloyalty, and narrow peasant leadership 
with which nearly all its political parts had been cursed. 
However, the new English rulers missed their chance, 
and eventually magnified these evils. 

As we have since found to our cost, they delayed 
the establishment of self-government which had been 
promised to their new subjects, and appointed a gov- 
ernor wholly unfitted for so delicate a task. They then 
removed the two prime causes that led the Boers to 
acquiesce in the change of rulership — they established 
a wise plan of government, restored order, and de- 
stroyed the power of those natives tribes which had 
threatened the Boers with annihilation. 

Freed from their enemies, and disappointed in their 
new guardians, the Transvaal Boers revolted, and at- 
tacked the British troops, with the result that the 
battles of Laing s Neck and Majuba Hill were recorded 
in the pages of history, and were fated to grow from 
the smallest of encounters to the most tremendous 
memories in the minds of both victors and vanquished. 

The British at that eventful period were wholly un- 



THE DUTCH IN SOUTH AFRICA 21 

prepared to fight, and the Boers were equally unable 
to match them if they had been ready ; but the Dutch- 
men won, and straightway fancied themselves in God's 
keeping, and unconquerable. The British, on the other 
hand, magnified their own defeat in the light of what 
their soldiers could have done had not their reinforce- 
ments been called off. 

At the time that the Boers revolted the only British 
troops were small scattered detachments. After their 
defeats they gathered a force which must have quickly 
and for ever ended Boer mischief and misrule in Africa ; 
but the home Government, under Gladstone, ordered 
an armistice, and made a new treaty, March, 1881, with 
the Boers, granting them self-government under British 
suzerainty. This was formally ratified in the following 
autumn. 

The Transvaal thus entered upon a new phase, and 
became a quasi-independent State under British sover- 
eignty, subject to British control in matters of foreign 
policy, to the passage of British troops through it in 
time of war, and to the giving of guarantees for the 
protection of the natives. It is worth noting, as it 
will be to the end of the chapter, that Great Britain did 
not vacate the paternal relation to these people and 
their State which it had declared at the outset, when 
the " Great Trek," or secession of the Boers, took place 
forty-five years before. 

The home Government resisted the inclination to 



22 HISTORICAL FOREWORD 

punish the Boers for their assaults upon its troops, 
because it was predicted that a racial war would break 
out all over South Africa if the Transvaal should be 
invaded. And yet we now see that this very magna- 
nimity produced the conditions for such a war, or rather, 
for the destruction of British rule on that half conti- 
nent, unless a subsequent resort to arms should restore 
unquestioned British supremacy. 

The petty victories at Laing's Neck and Majuba Hill 
so inflamed the vanity of the Boers, that in both the 
Dutch States and in the English colonies they ever 
afterwards boasted that one Boer was equal to ten or 
twenty English soldiers. 

Thus infatuated, and rendered more than ever am- 
bitious by the sudden enrichment of the Transvaal con- 
sequent upon the discovery of gold, and nursing an 
idle dream of one day conquering all South Africa, 
they treasured a project, based upon conspiracy and 
violence, for ending British rule upon that soil. 

Their plan in its conception offered nothing to the 
world at large, but was wholly selfish, and unjust to all 
others concerned. Since it stood for organised opposi- 
tion to the progress of Christendom, it became evident 
that the British must embrace the next opportunity to 
assert themselves and must do so with a blow more 
certainly decisive than Sir Evelyn Wood could have 
struck had he been allowed to advance his force in 
i88i. 



THE DUTCH IN SOUTH AFRICA 23 

After Majuba Hill the issue was not merely to be the 
continuance or finish of Boer independence ; upon it 
hung the preservation or the loss of all her South 
African colonies to Great Britain ! 

Unlike any other considerable body of colonists or 
emigrants of European stock of whom we possess 
knowledge, these Boers had markedly retrograded. 
During the lifetime of a generation they had been cut 
off from the world, and, to a surprising extent, even 
from companionship with one another. They had ex- 
isted without books, without contact with any of the 
intellectual or progressive influences that moved man- 
kind, without schools, almost without money — a com- 
munity of isolated families, each living wholly apart, 
and for itself. 

Perhaps in the establishment of churches they ap- 
peared to show progress, but it was merely in appeal^ 
ance, for these were in constant strife with one another. 
On the other hand, in individual valour, in love of in- 
dependence, and a degree of liberty which trespassed 
upon licence, and in their eagerness to combine against 
a foe, they were believed to have lost nothing. 

It is claimed that from the day of the restoration of 
their country to the Boers they exhibited a very slight 
regard for their treaty obligations. Certainly they 
compelled the British to oppose their aims. They 
sought to extend their borders in three directions and, 
above all, to reach the sea. They planned the occu- 



24 HISTORICAL FOREWORD 

pation of Mashonaland ; they entered Zululand and 
added three thousand square miles of it to their repub- 
lic ; and they invaded Bechuanaland and established 
their two petty governments which Great Britain 
caused them to abandon. 

During all this time they tried to secure a greater 
measure of independence, getting it in 1884 by means 
of a new treaty. This bound them to make no alli- 
ance with any other Power, foreign or native, except- 
ing the Free State, and to forbid slavery in their re- 
public. It gave them a "most favoured nation" 
clause, with provisions for the good treatment of for- 
eigners living and trading in the Transvaal.^ 

As this new treaty did not actually repeat the Brit- 
ish declaration of suzerainty, the Boers declared it to 
be abandoned. The British reply to this is that the 
Convention of 188 1, which asserts their suzerainty, is 
not affected by the changes of 1884, which were made 
only in some of the articles which follow that declara- 
tion. 

1 At a meeting out of which grew the new Convention of 1884, the 
following conversation occurred between Sir Hercules Robinson and 
Sir Evelyn Wood for the Crown, and Mr. Kruger for the Boers : — 

Sir H. Robinson : Before annexation, had British subjects complete 
freedom of trade throughout ? Were they on the same footing as citi- 
zens of the Transvaal ? 

Mr. Kruger : They were on the same footing as the burghers. There 
was not the slightest difference, in accordance with the Sand River 
Convention. 

Sir H. Robinson : I trust you will not object to that continuing. 

Mr. Kruger : No ; there will be equal protection for anybody. 



THE DUTCH IN SOUTH AFRICA 25 

The Convention of 1884 is explicit as to its limita- 
tions. It declares that ''her Majesty has been pleased 
to direct, and it is hereby declared, that the following 
articles of a new Convention . . . shall, when ratified 
by the Volksraad of the South African Republic, be 
substituted for the articles embodied in the Convention 
of August 3, 1881.'* 

The contention of the Boers, therefore, is a mere 
quibble. They did not ask for the abandonment of 
the British right of suzerainty, and the subject was 
not mentioned in the meeting at which the Boers ob- 
tained the changes for which they asked. Moreover, 
the practical application of the suzerainty, as shown 
in the command that the Transvaal make no treaties 
with foreign Powers except through her Majesty's dip- 
lomatic and consular officers abroad, is renewed in 
Article 4 of the new Convention. 

Dr. Theal says, in his short history of South Africa, 
that at about this time the Boers held themselves to 
be treated by England in a manner both unfriendly 
and unjust. The delay in the transferring of Swazi- 
land to the Transvaal, and the final bottling up of the 
republic by the British annexation of the land be- 
tween Natal and the Portuguese possessions, were the 
chief acts of which the Boers complained. 

Sir Evelyn Wood : And equal privileges ? 

Mr. Kruger : We make no difference as far as burgher rights are 
concerned. There may, perhaps, be some slight difference in the case 
of a young person who has just come into the country. 



26 HISTORICAL FOREWORD 

Re-established as a nation, a material change in 
their condition came with the discovery of gold in the 
Witwatersrand (white water's ridge) about 1885. 

With the sudden inrush of new settlers of European 
birth, and the enrichment of the little republic by its 
taxes upon the new industry, have arisen the griev- 
ances of the Uitlanders, the project of rebellion on 
their part, the bungling raid by Jameson, and, finally, 
the effort of the British Government to assert that 
suzerainty, or overlordship, which it declares it has 
never surrendered. 

These very recent events are so fresh in the mem- 
ory of the world that there is no need to retell their 
story here. What is more to the point is to state pre- 
cisely the extent and nature of the complaints which 
the Uitlanders have lodged at the court of universal 
public opinion, against President Kruger and his 
supporters. 

Since the Boers often drag in the great American 
Republic for purposes of comparison, it may be of in- 
terest to say that the case of the Uitlanders in the 
Transvaal in 1899, and that of the colonists in Amer- 
ica in 1776, are in truth very much alike, and, " no 
taxation without representation," once the cry of the 
misgoverned Transatlantic emigrants, is now the 
watchword of the Uitlanders. 

The revenue of the Transvaal has grown to more 
than ;£'4,ooo,cx>o from jf 178,000 in 1885, ^^^ this has 



THE DUTCH IN SOUTH AFRICA 27 

been wholly due to the energy and industry of the 
Uitlanders. They number three-quarters of the white 
population, and yet are governed by a parliament 
elected by one-quarter — a body, moreover, which is 
controlled by a government that is pledged to with- 
draw their rights from them. As M. Rouliot, a 
Frenchman, who is President of the Chamber of Mines 
at Johannesburg, has declared, " we are the most heav- 
ily taxed community in the world, though we are the 
one that has least voice in the use of the funds it 
contributes." 

Furthermore, as Mr. Spencer Wilkinson summarises 
the situation in his digest of history called " British 
Policy in South Africa," the Boer Government has 
broken its pledge to accord equal treatment to foreign 
settlers, by determinedly withdrawing the right of 
representation, by its concession of a monopoly for 
the sale of the dynamite used in the mines, by its un- 
just press law, and by its Aliens Expulsion Act, under 
which any foreigner can be expelled from the republic 
without trial, or proven guilty of any offence. 

The Boer Government has permitted the theft of 
three-quarters of a million pounds* worth of gold annu- 
ally, it has connived at the sale of liquor to the native 
mine labourers in contravention of its own laws, its 
agents have assaulted British citizens, and murdered one 
without offering apology or reparation ; they have 
broken up an orderly meeting of Uitlanders; and 



28 HISTORICAL FOREWORD 

degraded their own courts of justice. To this list Mr. 
James Bryce adds these other grounds of complaint : — 

" Thinking of South Africa as practically one coun- 
try, they (the Uitlanders) complained that here, and 
here only, were they treated as aliens and inferiors. 
Food was incredibly dear because a high tariff had been 
imposed on imports. Water supply, police, and sani- 
tation were all neglected. Not only was Dutch the 
ofificial language, but in the public schools Dutch was 
the only medium of instruction, and English children 
were compelled to learn arithmetic, geography, and 
history out of Dutch text books. It was these abuses 
that disposed them to revolt against a government 
which they despised." 

It was in 1892 that they attempted the reasonable 
and pacific method of agitation by argument. They 
founded a National Union at Johannesburg and pub- 
lished a statement of their grievances in Dutch for 
circulation among ths Boers. Next, they held a pub- 
lic meeting, passed resolutions, and appointed a com- 
mittee to wait upon President Kruger. It was to 
these gentlemen that the Boer leader said, " Cease 
holding public meetings and be satisfied ; go back to 
your people and tell them I shall never give them 
anything." 

Two years later, in 1894, thirteen thousand Uitland- 
ers signed a petition asking for the franchise, and 
in 1895 thirty-eight thousand five hundred signed 



THE DUTCH IN SOUTH AFRICA 29 

another, which was, like the first, rejected by the 
Volksraad. 

Then came that effort towards revolt which was 
frustrated by the impatient act of Dr. Jameson before 
the Uitlanders could secure arms ; and finally, after 
another two years of still growing discontent, began 
the efforts of the home Government to secure from 
President Kruger such concessions as should establish 
fair business conditions, and a tolerable political 
status, for the persecuted majority of white residents 
in the republic. 

The conference and correspondence during 1899 be- 
tween Sir Alfred Milner and President Kruger were 
mainly concerned with the British demand for a more 
just mode of meeting the Uitlanders' demand for citi- 
zens' rights in the Transvaal. 

The law, as framed at the time the last treaty was 
made between the two countries, fixed five years as 
the required term of residence ; but, with the inrush 
of foreigners upon the discovery of gold, the Boers 
enacted a new law, under which no person not a burgher, 
or a son of a burgher, could acquire full citizenship in 
less than fourteen years, or before the age of forty. 

At the beginning of the fourteen years he must 
renounce allegiance to his former country, and declare 
himself a subject of the Transvaal ; and at the end of 
the fourteen years he was to have the right— not to a 
vote— but to ask for one at the hands of the Volksraad, 



30 HISTORICAL FOREWORD 

which might then refuse it. The true purposes of this 
law, as well as its injustice, are too apparent to need 
pointing out. 

Sir Alfred Milner asked for the re-enactment of the 
original law, in force when the Transvaal pledged itself 
to give every British resident " the enjoyment of all 
civil rights, and protection to their lives and property." 
President Kruger offered to submit a bill giving the 
franchise in seven years, two of which should be years 
of waiting, and five for the completion of naturalisation. 

The High Commissioner declined to accept terms 
which required a man to abandon his old allegiance, 
and take a half-citizenship years before he could ac- 
quire full rights in the new country. The conference was 
broken off, and the Volksraad passed a law nominally 
requiring an enfranchisement term of seven years, but 
in reality preventing the enfranchisement of any 
Uitlanders who have lived in the Transvaal less than 
nine years. 

But the pith of the matter is outside of and far more 
important than this. It is that in this matter of the 
treatment of the foreign resident, the Transvaal Govern- 
ment and the Afrikander Bond — or union of the 
leading Boers all over South Africa — are acting in 
concert. 

This Bond urges disloyalty to the British upon those 
citizens who are of Dutch stock. It preaches an offen- 
sive policy ; it advocates the repudiation of British 



THE DUTCH IN SOUTH AFRICA 31 

supremacy, and the prevention of redress to the 
Uitlanders until Great Britain has surrendered her 
rights. Thus one race is secretly pledged to drive the 
other out of South Africa, and this other race, the 
British, is forced (in the view of Sir Alfred Milner 
among others) to demonstrate its power and its justice 
by obtaining for the Uitlander the rights to which he 
is entitled. 

The strained relations between the Uitlanders and 
the Transvaal Boers, and the manifest disinclination 
of President Kruger to do anything towards remedying 
what was complained of, led to a conference between 
the High Commissioner, Sir Alfred Milner, and 
President Kruger at Bloemfontein, in the Free State. 

In May, 1899, Sir Alfred Milner told the President 
that if he would change his policy toward the 
Uitlanders before things got worse, and take steps to 
satisfy the reasonable ones among them, who were, 
after all, the great majority in his country, the indepen- 
dence of his republic would be strengthened, and it 
would be easier to settle other questions between the 
two Governments. 

The High Commissioner declared that no proposal 
he would make should threaten the control of the 
country by the burghers, but President Kruger showed 
no inclination to meet any of the offers made to him, 
except one bearing on the form of oath to be adminis- 
tered to intending citizens. 



32 HISTORICAL FOREWORD 

At the second conference of these ambassadors of 
their respective countries the wily old Boer President 
took up much of the time with subjects not proposed 
to Sir Alfred Milner, or bearing upon those he 
broached. 

Thus he talked of a recent petition of the British 
in the Transvaal to the Queen as being bogus, com- 
plained of the arrival of British troops in the British 
colonies near by, and declared that the proposition to 
grant the reasonable requests of the foreigners, who 
had made his country what it is, would be worse than 
annexation, and would do away with the independence 
of his country. 

He had the assurance to insist that the interests 
of foreigners in his State were sufficiently looked after 
by the second Volksraad, or Lower House of the Boer 
Parliament — an ineffective, unimportant, makeshift 
body, established solely to make a hollow pretence of 
granting a relief which it was powerless even to 
approach. 

The further sittings showed a tendency to be given 
up to rambling and desultory talks. President Kruger 
could not be held to the statesmanlike point of the High 
Commissioner, which was the reconstruction of the 
franchise laws, so as to give a measure of represen- 
tation to foreigners by granting a vote upon a five 
years' residence. 

He talked of widely different things — settlement of 



THE DUTCH IN SOUTH AFRICA 33 

the Jameson Raid indemnity, incorporation of Swazi- 
land, and arbitration. Sir Alfred Milner, on the other 
hand, hoped to crystallise his efforts into an attempt 
to get a franchise law which would put the Uitlanders 
in a direct way of settling all other grievances for 
themselves. 

Finally, on the fifth day, President Kruger produced 
a Reform Bill which had but a faint resemblance to 
anything the High Commissioner had proposed. In 
this Bill it was provided that new-comers must register 
at once, give half a year's notice of intent to apply for 
naturalisation, which could be obtained in two years 
thereafter, to be followed in five years by the right of 
suffrage. 

This was unacceptable to Sir Alfred Milner, and 
nothing more favourable or final resulted from the 
conference. Autumn followed, the British began to 
move their troops nearer to the frontiers of the Free 
State and the Transvaal, and the Boers demanded their 
return to England. In October they declared it to be 
their ultimatum that unless the troops were recalled 
they would resort to war, and thus they, who had been 
for years preparing for it by equipping themselves with 
modern weapons and the building of forts, began the 
fighting. It had been England's plan not to move a 
great force into Africa until it was needed, and to act 
upon the defensive until the large body necessary for 
a speedy solution of the contest should arrive. This 



34 HISTORICAL FOREWORD 

programme she maintained with excessive losses, 
especially of her officers, at Glencoe and Elandslaagte 
in mid-October, when the Boers forced the fighting on 
the Natal frontier. 



PART III 

THE BOER ULTIMATUM AND ARMAMENT 

War became officially inevitable on the 9th of 
October, 1899. Unofficially, it had been inevitable 
for nearly twenty years. During the whole of that 
period the Transvaal and the Free State Governments 
had been arming themselves, upon a scale entirely 
inconsistent with any mere purpose of maintaining 
their position among South African States. They 
were in no danger of aggression from their white 
neighbours, and they were already sufficiently armed 
to safeguard them against native risings. 

The warlike preparations assumed, after the Jameson 
Raid, proportions which told all too plainly the end in 
view. An enormous number of field guns of the latest 
Krupp and Creusot patterns, guns of position, such as 
the famous *' Long Tom," Mauser rifles by the hundred 
thousand, and cartridges by tens of millions, were 
poured into Pretoria and Bloemfontein, mainly through 
the ordinary trade avenues of Cape Colony and Natal. 

The British Government took no notice of all this, 

1 This section and Chapter VII, have been prepared in London, under 
the author's direction, as his absence at the seat of war made it impos- 
sible for him to consult the records, and gather the material himself. 

35 



36 HISTORICAL FOREWORD 

though foreign residents in Johannesburg knew 
perfectly well what was going on, and to them, at 
least, it was no secret that, when the time came, the 
Dutch Republics would strike a blow for independence. 

Still the British Government took no notice. Com- 
putations were made by the landrosts and field cornets 
as to the number of available fighting men, and it was 
openly stated that at least 60,000 burghers, practically 
all mounted, could be put into the field. Why? The 
decisive moment arrived, as has been stated, on the 9th 
of October, when, after months of shilly-shallying, the 
Boer Government presented to the British agent at 
Pretoria a document, which was described by Lord 
Salisbury as " an audacious defiance." 

Although not in form an ultimatum as usually un- 
derstood in diplomacy, it was so in effect. It threw 
off every vestige of allegiance to the British crown ; it 
repudiated any right on the part of her Majesty's 
Government to interfere in the affairs of the Transvaal ; 
it complained of the massing of troops on the borders 
of the republic ; and it made the cool demand that the 
troops on the borders should be instantly withdrawn ; 
that all our reinforcements which had arrived since 
January ist, 1899, should be removed from South 
Africa within a reasonable time ; and that her Majesty's 
troops then on the high seas should not be landed in 
any part of South Africa. 

" Failing a satisfactory answer to these demands 



ULTIMATUM AND ARMAMENT 37 

before 5 p. m.," the message continued, " the Trans- 
vaal Government will, with great regret, be compelled 
to regard the action of her Majesty's Government as 
a formal declaration of war, for the consequence of 
which it will not hold itself responsible. Any further 
movement of troops in the nearer direction of the 
Transvaal borders will also be regarded as a formal 
declaration of war." 

The British reply was brief and to the point. It 
merely announced that her Majesty's Government 
had no further communication to make to Mr. Kruger 
at that moment. There was then in Natal a total 
British force of about fourteen thousand men ; in 
Cape Colony there was only the ordinary garrison. 
Practically the whole of the British frontiers were un- 
defended, and what this meant was perceived clearly 
enough, although too late, when it was announced 
that the Orange Free State intended to throw in its 
lot with the Transvaal. 

Nothing was at that time accurately known as to 
the armaments of the Boers. All that the British 
Government seemed aware of was that the Boers had 
laid in an enormous store of artillery, and small arms, 
and ammunition. Nor was anything very clearly un- 
derstood as to the disposition of the Boer forces. Mr. 
Kruger's chief complaint against Great Britain was 
that it had enormously increased its troops on the 
borders of Cape Colony and the two Republics. 



38 HISTORICAL FOREWORD 

In point of fact, as we knew to our cost later, he 
himself, and his brother President of the Orange Free 
State, had made far more extensive and aggressive 
preparations for war on their sides of the frontier. 
Large camps had been formed at Volksrust and Sand- 
spruit in Transvaal territory ; the Free Staters had 
gathered strong forces at Harrismith ; and all was in 
readiness to occupy Laing's Nek, and the other passes 
through the Drakensberg mountains. 

On the British side there was only the Natal field 
force of fourteen thousand men, while, on the other 
frontiers at Kimberley and Mafeking, there were only 
three thousand and two thousand five hundred respec- 
tively. Even then the British Government do not 
appear to have realized the seriousness of the task 
before it. It was not until the war had made some 
progress, and the surprisingly large strength of the 
republican forces became developed, that the Govern- 
ment at home made up its mind to anything like 
effective action. 

When, however, it did act, it made a show of con- 
siderable vigour. It decided to despatch to South 
Africa, under General Sir Redvers Buller, a complete 
army corps of fifty thousand men. This corps was 
mobilised with great rapidity, and in a very few days 
the troops were on the transports and afloat. Divis- 
ional commands were given to Lord Methuen, Sir Wil- 
liam Gatacre, and Sir Francis Clery. 



ULTIMATUM AND ARMAMENT 39 

As time went on, and the fortunes of war went 
steadily against the British, measures were taken on 
a still vaster scale, and so important were these that 
they ultimately rose to the dimensions of a supreme 
Imperial effort, to avert a danger threatening the very 
existence of the Empire. 

It is very interesting to trace the course of these 
stupendous operations. After the reverse of Nichol- 
son's Nek on the night of October 30-31, orders were 
given on a wholesale scale for the despatch of troops to 
the seat of war. Transports were engaged, a second 
army corps was mobilised, and in a very short time the 
great liners were conveying reinforcements with all 
speed southward. 

There came, in fact, a continuous stream of steam- 
ers from the English ports right up to the middle of 
November, when the general military situation had 
become so critical that a fifth division for South Africa 
was constituted. The permanent service sections B 
and C of the Army Reserves were called up for per- 
manent service ; and other arrangements were made 
for increasing the forces in the field on a substantial 

scale. 

One of the most interesting features of the campaign 
now began to assert itself. From all parts of the Em- 
pire came offers of men and munitions. These, which 
had at first been but coldly received by the War Office, 
were now gladly accepted. Australia and Canada 



40 HISTORICAL FOREWORD 

sent considerable contingents, while the lesser Colonies 
loyally contributed their share. 

So matters went on till the middle of December, 
when in one week three great disasters overtook the 
British arms. There was now seen such an outburst 
of martial and patriotic feeling as had never been 
recorded in the history of the British Empire. It is 
hardly too much to say that every man of fighting 
age was only too anxious to go to the front. 

Taking advantage at last of the eagerness of the 
people to assert the supremacy of our arms, and defend 
the integrity of the Empire, Government made a num- 
ber of calls upon the Volunteers and Yeomanry. Of 
the regulars a sixth division had already been sent 
out, and a seventh division, with further reinforcements 
of artillery, including a Howitzer Brigade, was ordered 
to proceed to South Africa without delay. Volun- 
teers were called for from the Militia, and it was 
decided to organise a special force from the Yeomanry, 
to consist of mounted infantry, certain to employ on 
the field of action all the qualities which distinguish 
the rural classes in England. 

One of the most striking incidents of this exciting 
period was the way in which the City of London came 
to the front. Within a very few days a special corps 
called the City of London Imperial Volunteers was 
raised, the cost of their equipment being mainly borne 
by public subscriptions ; and again from Australia and 



ULTIMATUM AND ARMAMENT 41 

Canada eager contingents were despatched, making 
the total number of men sent to the seat of war from 
England, India, and the Colonies, no less than one 
hundred and fifty thousand men. 

No such expedition had ever been undertaken by 
England, or, for the matter of that, by any other 
country. All this vast army, with its munitions, 
stores, medical service, and hospitals, had to be trans- 
ported a distance of seven thousand miles, and, al- 
though there were some blunders, and not a few- 
scandals, this stupendous work was carried through 
with general smoothness and celerity. 

Finally, the supreme command was accepted by 
Lord Roberts, who only a few hours before had re- 
ceived the news of the heroic death at Colenso of 
Lieut, the Hon. Frederick Roberts, his only son. 



TOWARDS PRETORIA 



TOWARDS PRETORIA 



CHAPTER I 

CAPETOWN TRANSFIGURED 

Capetown wakes up every morning and rubs its 
eyes, and stares at itself like a man who sees himself 
after his hair has turned white overnight. It cannot 
recognise its own photographs in these closing months 
of 1899. 

It used to be a humdrum little seaport capital, 
which only woke up when a steamer came in from 
London, but now it is so full of refugees that the 
pavements of its main thoroughfare are more crowded 
than those of Regent Street at four o'clock on a sum- 
mer afternoon. 

There are said to be sixty thousand refugees here 
from Johannesburg and Kimberley, and they have 
jumped the city up into the semblance of a western 
metropolis. 

One can see that it must have been an interesting 
place before the war. It clings to the base of a tow- 
ering, naked rock, as the seaweed clutches the small 
boulders on the beach. Leave out the rock, and 

43 



44 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

Capetown bears much resemblance to Galveston, 
Texas, or is a little like the European quarter of Bom- 
bay. 

But you cannot leave out the rock, which hangs in 
the sky at the end of every inland view. It is a moun- 
tain, with its top planed off like a table, and white 
clouds rolling over it as if the cloth was being laid 
ever so many times a day for meals for the gods of 
the Hottentots, who must have nothing else to do 
than to eat, now that their worshippers have suc- 
cumbed to the lead and the liquids of the white. 

Before the war Capetown held a wonderful mixture 
of human contrasts — a few thousands of Mahommedan 
Malays in fezes, a few more thousands of English, and 
a still larger number of *' Cape people,'' who look like 
negroes, but are a mixture of Dutch, Hottentots, and 
Bushmen. Dutch is generally heard in the capital, 
and the colony, because there are five Dutchmen to 
every four Englishmen here, and the Malays and 
negroes and their mixtures all think in Dutch. 

It is the lingo of the cabbies, newsboys, labourers, 
servants, street urchins, and of some minor officials. 
As a matter of fact, it is not really Dutch which these 
speak, but a hodge-podge of Dutch, Kaffir, Bush, and 
Hottentot words. 

Capetown's vehicles are like no others. Trains of 
waggons are pulled about by traction engines ; smaller 
loads go on flat platforms upon low wheels ; the 



CAPETOWN TRANSFIGURED 45 

country folk ride in two-wheeled, two-horse hooded 
carriages called Cape carts, and the city folk use elec- 
tric trams and Cape hansoms. The tramcars fill the 
air with the clangour of gongs, and the grinding of 
wheels against curves. But the hansoms are fit to win 
a leather medal for drollness. They are made by 
somebody who once saw a real hansom, and then 
nearly forgot how it looked. They are bulky and low, 
and have curious tasselled curtains in the windows. 
They are closed by flaps like old-fashioned cellar-doors, 
and they are all named, as if they were yachts. 

The names are painted on the curved sides of the 
roofs. " Lily of Killarney," " Alert," '' Despatch," 
♦' Belle of the Cape," " Cecil Rhodes," " Duke of Con- 
naught " — these are some of the names you read on 
them, and I am told that, presently, some cabbies will 
have the enterprise to rechristen their cabs '' Glencoe " 
and " Mafeking." More disreputable cabmen never 
were seen. They do not mind being in their shirt- 
sleeves, or wearing umbrella-shaped hats, or dressing 
almost in rags for that matter. 

Capetown is somewhat free and easy, like a great 
many other English colonial towns. I found two 
negro chambermaids asleep on the chairs in my bed- 
room at the Grand Hotel this afternoon. I apologised 
for disturbing them, but they begged me not to speak 
of it, as they were thoroughly rested. 

The shops outrank those you will find in many pro- 



46 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

vincial cities of Great Britain. They show enormous 
stocks of goods from England, Germany, and America. 
As far as I can discover, the only home manufactures 
are matches, ice, and Cape tobacco. The commonest 
walking-sticks come from Germany, and even the 
neckties and collars are marked ** made in London 
for , Capetown.** 

There are fortunes to be gathered here by the manu- 
facture of necessaries, for labour is abundant, cheap, and 
tractable, and there is a half continent to supply — an 
English half continent, it will be, in a few weeks or 
months. 

But you find the slenderest variety of food, because 
their agriculture is primitive, and the raising of delica- 
cies has not been thought of. The cooks are either 
men who have failed at everything else, or women who 
turn a five-course dinner out of a frying-pan. Stop- 
ping at a first-class hotel reminds me of life on the 
Channel boats that run to St. Malo, but I think dif- 
ferently when I pay my bill, for the charges are im- 
pressive. They expect a shilling for the risk of ac- 
cepting a Bank of England £$ note. 

This is war time, and Capetown is the headquarters 
of the British. It keeps step to the bugle and the 
drum, and nobody runs out of doors any longer to see 
soldiers on the march. The Volunteers do most of the 
marching, as they are in camps near by in the fields. 

When the Regulars and the Marines go to the front, 



CAPETOWN TRANSFIGURED 47 

they are rushed from the ships to the cars so quickly 
that paragraphs about them in the next day's papers 
attract more attention than the actual movements of 
the men. 

During several nights in October the railway station 
in this city was the most exciting spot on earth. The 
earlier trains had been fired on by the Boers, who had 
swarmed further and further south, and every night 
the train's journey was shortened, until at last it ran 
ran no further north than De Aar, well within the 
colony. 

To limit the crowds that came to see the troops off, 
threepence was charged for admission to the platform, 
and even then there was a crush worth going far to 
avoid. The carriages were filled with soldiers in khaki, 
officers in civilian attire, and hundreds of Cape Boys 
and Kaffirs, who were hired as transport helpers. 

Other officers, idle citizens, wondering Mahometans, 
and excited negresses formed the crowd that saw them 
depart. The Tommies kept quiet and smoked, while 
the Cape negroes sang and shouted, and the semi- 
savage Kaffirs chanted war songs and danced, mainly 
with their hips and stomachs, as performers do in the 
streets of Cairo exhibitions. 

I stopped and talked to a dozen of these Kaffirs. 
" Oh, Fve heard de Queen," said one. '* She spoke to 
me, and I heard what she said. She said, ' Boy, you 
better go to war ! ' " 



48 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

At this the whole dozen yelled a war-cry, and the 
song and dance were renewed. 

The supreme moment comes when the train starts. 
Then the Tommies leap to their feet, and thrust their 
hands out of the windows for a good-bye shake. 

" Don't be too proud, sir," one of them called to me. 

But nobody is too proud to shake good luck and a 
God-speed to the soldier rushing to battle. 

Though I can hardly believe it myself, I saw smart 
ofificers of the finest English regiments shaking hands 
not only with the privates, but with the Kaffirs, as the 
train swung by, and the air was torn with shouts, and 
songs, and cheers. 

Whenever more troops come in these scenes will be 
repeated, until the war ends. Where the troops are 
going each night few persons know, for though this is 
a British colony, every other man carries Boer blood, 
and is a possible sympathiser with the enemy. 

Therefore there is a strong censorship on gossip, as 
there is upon Press news. Whether the brave boys 
are going to Natal, or straight north to De Aar no 
one can guess, for the first part of each journey is the 
same. 



CHAPTER II. 

SIR ALFRED MILNER'S TRIALS. 

The view of Sir Alfred Milner as Governor of the 
British, and not of the Dutch, in this colony, and as a 
man whose house has been overrun with Jingoes, and 
plotters against the peace of the colony, is not at all 
the view of him which has been adopted in Capetown. 

I have heard his position discussed by some of the 
most prominent men in private and public life, who 
have lived there either since birth or since boyhood, 
and who are quite competent to pass judgment upon 
his relation to the colony. 

If Dutch citizens of the Cape are displeased with 
the Governor, it is only because he is an Englishman, 
and has England at his back. That is more than suf- 
ficient to anger a great percentage of them. But they 
are no more displeased with him now than the Eng- 
lish were six months after he came. 

The war was not brought about by him, but has 

been preparing for at least twenty years. During that 

period the loyal English here and in Natal have at 

times felt that they could not endure their trials, at 

4 49 



50 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

times that the home Government was never going to 
rescue them or itself from the rapidly-growing tenden- 
cies of a most dangerous situation. 

It has been all along a condition in which part of 
the population was loyal, and the other part was 
planning an Afrikander empire wherein the British, 
already despised, were to have no voice or even rest- 
ing-place. When Sir Alfred Milner first came to take 
this most thankless post, it was with the leading men 
of the Afrikander party that he spent so much of his 
time as to cause the English to feel that he was being 
hoodwinked, and that once again there had come to 
them a High Commissioner who would tide over a 
long term of office without mending the condition cf 
affairs. 

They knew that in such a case the irreconcilable 
Dutch of the entire half continent would still further 
arm and equip themselves for rebellion, while the 
loyal British would remain helpless under more and 
more insufferable insult and abuse, unarmed in the 
Dutch States, and impotent in their own largest 
colony. 

President Kruger fancied that Sir Alfred was neither 
Governor of the Dutch nor of the English, but was a 
plaything of the cunning Government at Pretoria. 

A now famous speech of the Dutch President puts 
his views as pithily as words can express them. Kru- 
ger has lost the thumb of his left hand, and telling this 



SIR ALFRED MILNER'S TRIALS 51 

story he used the four remaining fingers of that hand 
to emphasise his words : — 

" First," said he, holding his right hand little finger 
with his left hand, '' there was Bartle Frere — psst ! I 
got the best of him " ; with that he doubled that finger 
down. "Then," said he, taking hold of the next 
finger, " there was Rosmead. Psst ! I got the best of 
him," and he turned that finger down. '' Next came 
Loch. Psst ! I got the best of him. And then came 
Rosmead again. Psst ! he was nothing, no more 
than before. And now," he said, pretending to be 
going to turn down his missing thumb as he had bent 
his fingers, " here is Milner. Ach, Gott ! dar is nicht ! " 
(there is nothing !) 

Thus we see that at the outset, when the English 
feared that the Dutch were bewitching the Governor 
with their pretensions of loyalty and promises of re- 
form, the Dutch were quite as well satisfied that, if he 
was not their Governor, he was at least not to be feared 
by them. 

About this time, an American, a conspicuous mem- 
ber of this community, returned from a visit to the 
country, where he met the Governor, and hearing a 
group of Englishmen complaining of this new disap- 
pointment, broke out with this comment : — 

" He's pumping the other side dry, I tell you. I 
met him and spent an afternoon with him, and when 
we parted I got to thinking over what had been said 



52 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

on both sides, and I discovered that I had told him 
everything I knew, and he had told me nothing. He 
pumped me dry, and I tell you all now that when you 
see him with Hofmeyr, and Schreiner, and all the rest 
of those fellows, he is simply doing to them what he 
did to me, and what he will do to you when your turn 
comes. He is pumping both sides dry." 

That view of the new Governor, so fresh at the time, 
has now come to be regarded as prophetic, for when 
Sir Alfred had heard everything that could be told 
him by the Dutch leaders, he began the same process 
with the English. He did not drop the Dutch, or 
quarrel with them, nor has he done so yet. To judge 
him by his public conduct, he seems to have taken 
mental notes of all that he heard from either side, and 
to have compared, and examined, and tried to balance, 
the two views of the situation. 

At last he came to a decision, slowly, calmly, and 
with judicial deliberation. 

What he learned, and why he believed the situation 
in the Transvaal required immediate relief, the people 
of England do not know, and can hardly imagine, if 
what is told me by the most responsible and best 
informed Englishmen in this colony is true. 

Again, if what they say is to any extent true, for 
all tell of precisely the same state of affairs, then Sir 
Alfred Milner is at once worthy of the extremest sym- 
pathy and the utmost admiration. He has been placed 



SIR ALFRED MILNER'S TRIALS 53 

in a position in which he has been debarred from 
making public in his own country those facts which 
weighed most heavily in the formation of his opinion. 

The publication of such facts could have done noth- 
ing but increase the evils of the situation here, and 
perhaps put a match to explosives which thus far, 
thanks to his diplomacy, were still at rest. As it is 
he is no longer criticised by any Englishmen, and if 
the Afrikander element is dissatisfied, it is a condition 
not to their credit as British subjects. As Governor 
he " pumped everybody dry," and now as High Com- 
missioner he is acting devotedly for the best interests 
of the Crown. 

I have had the good fortune to pay my respects to 
Sir Alfred Milner at Government House during a visit 
which was necessarily brief, because he is working 
sixteen hours a day. He shows the consequence of 
his toil in a face and frame so thinned that his friends 
in London would scarcely know him. Care, too, has 
written its lines deeply on his countenance. He makes 
such an impression upon a visitor, that not even a 
Little Englander who saw him here could carry criti- 
cism very far in writing of him afterwards. 

His modesty is his most remarkable characteristic, 
and next to that, I think, one notices his earnestness, 
and the degree to which his mind is concentrated upon 
the situation around him. In the play of his features 
and voice there is great evidence of kindliness and 



54 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

sympathy. These, with a modicum of humour thrown 
in, are the chief ingredients in what is called tact, so 
that you cannot see him, talk to him, or be with him 
without feeling that since diplomacy has failed to re- 
lieve the tension here, and war has followed, it cannot 
have been the fault of so gentle, so self-possessed, so 
calm a man. 

I have also seen Sir Forestier Walker at his desk in 
a bare room of the old Dutch " castle " or fort, and 
have enjoyed that visit, for he is a man of the frankest 
and most affable nature. 

Both the civil and the military leaders are of one 
type — tall, slender, strong, and wiry men, whose youth 
resists their years, and who take so much of the bur- 
den of the moment on their own shoulders, that all 
who are under them work cheerfully and with a will. 



CHAPTER III 

BRAVE OFFICERS AND RICH REFUGEES 

On every ship that arrives in Capetown from the 
north are many British officers. Some bring a dozen 
or twenty ; others as many as fifty. They are the 
pick and flower of Englishmen. Most of them are 
young men, in the late twenties and early thirties, 
bearing distinguished names, exhibiting the long, re- 
fined faces of the British aristocracy, carrying them- 
selves at once like dandies and like athletes. 

The one strange thing about them is that nobody is 
sending them here, and they do not know to what 
part of the seat of war they are bound, or what they 
are going to do. They only know that they could not 
keep away. They are here to see what they call " the 
fun." It is a war against bushwhackers, guerillas, and 
sharpshooters, in which a far greater proportion of 
officers than men are certain to be killed, but that does 
not matter to them. The first accounts of skirmishes 
they read after they have landed tell of the special 
dangers which they have to face. Apparently the 
manner in which the enemy reveals its presence among 

55 



56 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

the hills out Natal way is by the dropping of an officer 
from his saddle, or in his tracks, as he pushes ahead 
of his men. What of that ? It is part of " the fun," 
they say. 

These fine young fellows have come during their 
leave of absence, which has been well earned by active 
service in disagreeable climates, in lonely garrison 
posts, in the Sudan, or on the Indian frontier. One 
who came out with me has given up a billet for which 
he had long been striving, and which was offered to 
him just as he had determined to come here and do 
a little fighting for variety. Another of my com- 
panions on the voyage was starting fully equipped 
to make a tour of the world, but this excitement 
proved more attractive. A third officer on the 
same ship arrived in England to see his people, 
from whom he had long been separated ; he got, how- 
ever, no further than London, and only stayed four 
days when he caught the spirit of his comrades and 
bolted for South Africa. On another ship was a young 
man with an income of ;^40,ooo a year who was just 
about to be married, but instead of taking his bride to 
St. George's he asked her down to Waterloo to see 
him off for Durban. 

I watched these men on shipboard during seventeen 
days. They were up at six o'clock every morning, 
running so many dozen times round the deck in 
slippers and pyjamas in order to keep themselves in 



BRAVE OFFICERS AND RICH REFUGEES 57 

good condition, then plunging into a cold bath, and 
coming back to the deck again in flannels, as fresh and 
blooming as new-cut flowers. All day they read about 
South Africa in the little libraries they had brought 
along with them, and which they exchanged for similar 
books that other men had brought on board. They 
were, emphatically, the best of Englishmen — wide- 
awake, well-informed, proud, polished, polite, con- 
siderate, and abounding with animal health and high 
spirits. 

The more I saw of them the more I resented all 
that we hear about various fanatical people on earth 
who are celebrated for not being afraid to die — the 
Sudan dervishes, the stolid Turks, the pilfering Al- 
banians, and now, last of all, these wooden-headed 
Boers. Of some of these we are told that they wel- 
come death, of others that they believe themselves in 
God's special care. 

And what of these English ? Are they afraid to 
die ? Who would say such a thing — or think it for a 
moment — of these splendid fellows who have led Eng- 
land's ranks against every fanatic on earth except the 
Turk ? They are as ready to die as any men, and they 
rank above their foes as towers rise above the lowly 
grass, because they risk their lives with a full knowl- 
edge of what they are doing, and because in risking 
themselves they risk the most enviable lot of which 
any man can boast. 



58 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

The incomes and homes, the wives and sisters, the 
companions and sports and clubs of these men, the 
comforts and the luxuries with which they can sur- 
round themselves whenever they will, are ties which 
must make life dearer to them than the bare, hard lot 
of most of the poor wretches whom historians and 
poets have glorified for not fearing death ; but every 
one of those, I honestly believe, fears it more than 
these splendid, dashing fellows, who keep on carving 
empires out of the map of the world to swell the 
British Empire. 

"Been to Government House?" I asked one of 
these men yesterday. 

*' No," said he, " and Fm not going. I am afraid 
they might send me somewhere out of the thick of 
things. I don't want them to know I'm here. I'm 
going to wherever its liveliest. I'll be certain to find 
somebody under whom I have served, or with whom 
I have fought, and so I'll see the best of it." 

And that was the man who told me that out of a 
hundred men with whom he studied for the service 
seventy-five are dead already — fifteen of illnesses, and 
sixty of bullet wounds and spear thrusts ! 

It is disgusting to leave these men, and turn into 
any one of the Capetown hotels to find yourself sur- 
rounded by the rich refugees from Johannesburg, and 
to hear them cry like children as they tell you what 
they will lose if the British do not hurry up and take 



BRAVE OFFICERS AND RICH REFUGEES 59 

the Transvaal, before the Boers destroy Johannes- 
burg. 

In their dismay they actually weep over their plates 
at dinner, and half-strangle themselves by sobbing as 
they drink their whisky at bed-time. The Mount 
Nelson, the Queen's, and the Grand Hotels are all full 
of these merchants and millionaires, faring on the fat 
of the land, idle, loafing all of every day, and discussing 
what per cent, of their losses the British Government 
will pay when they put in their claims at the end of 
the war. 

Some came here as clerks, some as labourers in the 
mines, and some are merchants who brought ^10 
worth of goods out from Birmingham a dozen years 
ago. They tell you that they have left i^ 100,000 
worth, or ;^8o,ooo worth of goods in their shop, and 
that altogether ^25,000,000 is in danger of destruc- 
tion in Johannesburg. 

" Oh, mine Got ! " one has just been saying to me ; 
" I can'd dell how much I shall lose by dis peezness. 
I shpeak mit much feeling, my frent. Blease excoose 
me grying. Vot do you dink ! Do you dink I can 
git back dirty-dree per cent, of vot I lose from de 
British Government ? Oh, Got ! den I lose ;^6o,ooo — 
ain'd it derrible ? " 

They are pulling their long faces all over the place, 
and shedding their tears wherever you meet them. It 
is enough to make a statue ill to have to hear and see 



6o TOWARDS PRETORIA 

them and move among them. Why don't they equip 
a regiment of rough-riders or make up a battalion of 
volunteers among themselves ? Why don't they fight ? 
The war has jeopardised their property, and they have 
a keener interest in it than any Tommy, or any officer 
now at the front. How can they see the cream and 
flower of English manhood rushing down here to spill 
its precious blood for them, and never feel a blush of 
shame, or a pang of any emotion except grief over 
personal losses which will still leave many of them 
rich ? 

Really, Capetown is a wonderful place. It is worth 
the journey to see the streets blocked by able young 
men, and the hotels crowded by rich refugees, while 
each night's train takes out the fearless gentlemen who 
are deliberately risking not only their lives but more 
of worldly advantage than can ever come to these 
skulkers, who cling to the shelter of England's guns, 
and weep while they wait for men to die, that they 
may rush up to the British Treasury with their claims. 

If the exhibition these refugees are making in Cape- 
town were as important at it is conspicuous, one would 
think the Englishmen in charge here would drop the 
contest where it is, and go home in disgust. But it is 
only a phase of a side issue, quite apart from the 
principle at stake, * 



CHAPTER IV 

THE BOER AT HOME 

A German correspondent took me aside in the City 
Club one day and said : " You see, the Boers have been 
playing us all for fools. They have allowed the world 
to believe that they can only fight behind rocks, and 
while the British acted on this belief they have come 
right out in the open and given them a huge surprise, 
bottling up Kimberley and cutting off all communi- 
cation with it, besides capturing trains, destroying 
bridges, and all the rest." 

Almost as he spoke out of his dense ignorance, an 
American born in Natal, and now a man of wealth and 
position in South Africa, drifted to our group and 
told us his very different opinion of the enemy. 

** The British talk about keeping on the defensive 

until their whole force is in position in December ; but, 

mark my words, it will all be over before then. I was 

born among the Boers, I speak their language, I have 

hunted with them, seen them in war, been intimate 

with them in all the States and colonies, and I tell you 

they will not hold out. They are fanatics, but their 

6i 



62 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

fanaticism goes only so far. They have never seen 
more than a thousand British in war, and these they 
have potted at from behind rocks while the British 
were wholly exposed. 

" They fancy this is to be always the rule. I can 
cite you instances in several wars with natives, where 
the Boers absolutely refused to occupy positions of 
danger. They want to kill, but do not at all relish 
being killed. They are so closely related, and so 
much inter-married, that the killing of a Boer makes 
mourning in forty families. The killing of forty Boers 
would practically put the whole Transvaal in mourn- 
ing. 

" I will predict within a very little what is going to 
happen. To begin with, they detest discipline, and 
always dispute with their leaders. Every man who 
knows them will tell you that even when they make 
up a hunting party they waste the best time of the 
day arguing over every plan that is proposed. Eng- 
lishmen who hunt with them have learned to say to 
them, ' You stay here and talk it out, we are going in 
such a direction,' and then they go off, and leave the 
Boers to follow them. In war they will want to argue 
every plan that is proposed, and they will rapidly 
grow more and more discontented. 

"Their habit is for each Boer to look out for him- 
self. All are farmers, and every man in the field has 
left his affairs with no one in charge. They are not 



THE BOER AT HOME 63 

professional soldiers like the British, they are not will- 
ing to die like the British, they are not paid like the 
British. By and by they will begin to go home. 
They will say that they must look after their farms, 
and when they decide to do so, nothing can stop them. 

*' I passed through the Transvaal a few days ago, 
and I had two remarkable conversations which go to 
show how peculiar the Boers are. The first was with a 
man who had been sent to a Boer house to collect 
some taxes that were long overdue. He rode up to 
the house, called out the head of the family, and stated 
his errand. The Boer turned on his heel and went in- 
doors at once. Presently he came out again with his 
loaded gun. 

^' ' See here,' said he, ' I own this house and all the 
land as far as you can see around you. It is mine. I 
am king here. You go back and tell Paul Kruger that 
if he sends another man here for that five pounds of 
taxes I will kill the man. As for you, if you say any 
more about it I will shoot you.' 

" My second talk was with a field cornet, whom I 
chanced to meet. Said he, ' They are talking of going 
to war with the English. Well, my people all hate 
the damned English, but they are not satisfied with 
the way things are going. They tell me that they 
hear that Oom Paul is rich ; that he rides in a car- 
riage, and does no work. They say they are poor and 
are getting nothing out of the Government stealings, 



64 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

and that if they are sent to war Kruger had better 
look out, or they may come with their guns and ask 
him to divide with them ! " 

" I want to see the Boers,'* said I. " I think of 
going to Stellenbosch to see them in their homes. Is 
that a good place to test ? " 

" No. You might as well go to Piccadilly Circus to 
see the English farmer or the Scotch Highlander. 
The Boers in Cape Colony are so very different from 
those in the Transvaal that we never call them Boers. 
We speak of them as Afrikanders. They are one hun- 
dred years ahead of the Transvaal Boer. They are 
refined. They have schools and colleges. They have 
never been far or long removed from civilisation and 
the English. You will get very wrong ideas if you go 
and see the Cape Dutch and write them up as Boers. 

" Would you like me to describe a Transvaal Boer 
home and family ? Very well, I know them nearly 
all, and have stopped with scores of them, for they 
are kindly and hospitable, except when their animosi- 
ties are aroused. A Boer house is a building made of 
brick and roofed with zinc. It is divided into two 
rooms, with a wing or lean-to at the back. That wing 
is the kitchen where the Kaffir girl works. The other 
two rooms are the bedroom and the living-room. The 
sleeping room has as many beds as are required — 
usually a large one for the man and wife, and another 
for the children. Often you will see the children's 



THE BOER AT HOME 65 

bed pushed under that of the parents. The living- 
room contains a long table and some chairs, seated 
and backed with strips of leather. There will be an- 
other, smaller table, covered with American oil-cloth, 
on which the frau keeps her simple treasures. These 
and some pictures, pinned up without frames, are the 
only ornaments, and a sort of settee with a seat made 
of leather strips completes the furniture. 

" There may sometimes be a harmonium in the cor- 
ner of the room, and if you can play any simple tunes 
the whole family will dance as long as you like to play. 
For books there is certain to be a Bible, and there will 
be a prayer-book if they can afford it. They are re- 
ligious, you know ; that is, they go to church, and are 
fond of thinking themselves in God's keeping, but 
they never let religion interfere with business. At 
a horse trade they will cheat the back teeth out of 
your head. 

" You have heard that they sleep in their clothes ? 
Well, the man takes off his coat and waistcoat, and 
sleeps in whatever else he has on. The wife drops off 
an outer skirt, perhaps, before she gets into bed. Of 
late extra rooms have been added to the houses of the 
better class Boers ; but in the old style, typical, two- 
roomed house, whoever stops overnight must sleep 
with the old folks or children. When you sleep with 
the old folks the husband always takes the middle of 
the bed. 
5 



66 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

" A story which I know is true, is told of Bishop 
Merriman. He was once entertained in this way, and 
when he woke in the morning he found that the Boer 
had crept out to look after his cattle. He gave one 
glance at his sleeping companion, and dropped out of 
bed as quickly as if he had been thrown out. 

" As to any signs of their ablutions, you will seldom 
see a Boer with a clean face. One of them has written 
to a Capetown relative that his people will not wash 
until they have driven the British into the sea. That 
sounds impressive, but will not entail much hardship 
upon his people. 

" They tell a story about Paul Kruger's ' polish ' 
after he had been to London and seen the Queen and 
Mr. Gladstone. It is not a true tale, but it might 
easily be true of the average Boer. The story goes 
that when Kruger came home, and was about to get 
into bed, his wife came in and saw him dressed in a suit 
of pyjamas. 'Paul!' she exclaimed, 'what are you 
doing with those English fool clothes? Take them 
off and put on your trousers, and go to bed like an 
honest burgher.' 

'' As to their intelligence, you know the very old 
story of the Englishman who was walking through 
Cape Colony, and was warned never to say he was 
English in any house where he was asking for a meal. 
He always said he was ' from Yorkshire,' and was 
handsomely treated. I don't know whether that 



THE BOER AT HOME 6^ 

is true or not, but it is not an exaggerated illustra- 
tion. 

" A leading Boer told me the other day that his 
countrymen would not stop until they have driven the 
English into Table Bay. ' And then,' said he, ' we 
shall go on and capture England.' 

" ' How can you do that without ships ? ' I asked 
him. 

" * Oh,' he replied, ' how did Moses get the children 
of Israel across the Red Sea ? They did not need any 
ships. Just in the same fashion God will find a way 
for us.' 

" Another Boer who was talking of England, said to 
me, * I suppose you can see England from Capetown, 
can't you ? ' " 

Finally, my friend closed his remarks by saying that 
it was impossible to give me a clear idea of the Boers 
in such a short talk. He cautioned me to recollect 
that there are the Dutch in Cape Colony, who are one 
hundred years ahead of the better class Dutch who 
live in houses in the Transvaal. 

"These," he said, *' are the ones about whom I have 
been speaking. But these, in turn, are far ahead of 
the Boers who move north and south with their cattle 
every year, and live at least a part of the time in 
tents." 



CHAPTER V 

IDLERS AND MILLIONAIRES 

The refugees, by whom London had dealt so gener- 
ously, formed the most conspicuous feature of every 
landscape in Capetown. 

The people of the city went about their business, 
and were doing many times more of it than they ever 
had done before ; but they made scarcely any show, 
they were so outnumbered on all sides by the refugees. 
These, having nothing else to do, lined the pavements, 
blocked the shop doors, and formed living walls round 
the open spaces where Volunteers seemed to be for 
ever drilling. 

Worry breeds worry, and a week ago the authorities 
were so anxious lest they might have trouble with the 
disloyal Dutch subjects of the Queen, that they went 
further, and borrowed trouble by anticipating possible 
desperation among the strangers when the time came 
that all should have spent the little money they pos- 
sess. 

The police had orders not to allow pedestrians to 

loiter in the streets, and it was a difficult matter to 
68 



IDLERS AND MILLIONAIRES 69 

live in the city, because one could not wait for a tram- 
car, or stop to shake hands with a friend, without being 
ordered by a policeman to move on. Such zeal was 
too excessive to last, and soon the crowds were allowed 
to stand about as they pleased. 

There were thousands of these refugees. They ap- 
peared to be all men, because the women were kept in 
their lodgings and the buildings allotted to them, look- 
ing after their children. 

It was the men only who were crowding the streets, 
mainly young fellows who were miners in Johannes- 
burg before they were expelled. They used to earn 
as much as ;^24 a month, out of which the majority 
spent no more than ^8 for living. They are so gener- 
ally thrifty that large numbers went to England every 
year, and those who did not dissipate their savings in 
this manner accumulated tidy sums in the bank. 
Among them were Americans, Australians, English, 
and other Europeans, but the great majority were 
what we call Anglo-Saxons. 

Scores of hard characters had come here with them, 
and they may give trouble when the pinch comes ; but 
they had not done much mischief yet. 

The banks now displayed warnings to customers not 
to leave their money on the counters, as several sums 
had been snatched by thieves, and once in a while 
there was a comxmotion in the streets over the enter- 
prise of a pickpocket ; but South African mining 



;o TOWARDS PRETORIA 

crowds have always been quite orderly, and they are 
likely to keep their good name. 

Some of the most unruly Uitlanders in the Trans- 
vaal, many of whom were released from the gaols, were 
rumoured to have been landed at Delagoa Bay, penni- 
less and hungry, and to have set that little place in a 
panic of fright, but that class had not reached Cape- 
town. 

The air vibrated with pitiful stories told by the 
refugees of their trials on the way to British protec- 
tion. Men had been driven away from the bedsides 
of dying children ; enceinte women had been hustled 
out of the Transvaal along with the strongest ; Boers 
had slapped the faces of women refugees for complain- 
ing of ill-treatment, and thousands of men and women 
had been obliged to carry all their goods for miles, 
where the metals of the railway were torn up near the 
Orange Free State border. 

The theme of the moment was Boer outrages ; but 
this was natural under the circumstances, and while 
many of the stories were true, many others were 
neither quite true nor quite false. We are fighting 
the Boer, and since he has chosen to resort to war, it 
will be enough for him if he is served with the best 
fighting that England knows how to give him. 

At a meeting of the officials of the city it was agreed 
that several hundreds of these idle men should be 
offered work at reclaiming land, at railway building 



IDLERS AND MILLIONAIRES 71 

elsewhere in the colony, at making macadam for roads 
and streets, and at other labour, much of it being 
forced, in order to give self-support to those who are 
eager to work and unwilling to take charity. 

It was not a moment too early to begin providing 
this relief for the men. The women, who seemed to 
be generally in greater distress, were in the care of the 
Ladies' Relief Committee, a very energetic and enthu- 
siastic body. Over all was the gigantic Lord Mayor's 
Fund, which had been very little drawn upon as yet. 
How far it would go, and what would happen when 
all the refugees were penniless, time alone could dis- 
close. There were men in Capetown who pulled very 
long faces when this subject was discussed, and some 
who said frankly that they expected a period of law- 
lessness to end the extraordinary situation. 

In the meantime, it had to be remembered that 
there was a class of millionaire refugees whose lot was 
very unlike that of these idlers in the streets. So very 
many millionaires have been pointed out to me that I 
suspect the term is quite an elastic one, which takes 
in everybody who can afford to pay from a pound to 
two pounds a day at the best hotels in the city. Some 
few were undoubtedly very rich, and are even famous 
for their successes on the Rand. 

When I think of these fortunate folk, two very 
pleasant pictures rise before my memory. One is a 
scene at the Queen's Hotel, down on the bay, where 



72 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

flowers and grass meet the dark green sea. The moon 
hangs like a brilliant ball amid a myriad brighter stars 
and planets than we of the north ever see, and all their 
beams concentrate upon a well ordered garden, on 
whose paths the so-called millionaires stroll after dinner. 

The men smoke, and the ladies in styHsh gowns 
parade to and fro, laughing and chatting as if there 
were no war that had made them all exiles from their 
former land, and luxurious homes. A great many 
here are Hebrews. 

The next scene is at the Mount Nelson Hotel. It is 
dinner time. A grand dining-hall, sparkling with plate 
and crystal, and set with snowy table linen, contains 
sixty or seventy persons in ultra-fashionable attire. 
The ladies are in decollete dresses, and gems flash upon 
their necks and bodices. Musicians play to them 
from a gallery at one end of the hall, and Swiss waiters 
serve them with the delicacies of the London market, 
brought here in refrigerators by the ships of the Castle 
line. 

The talk is of the opera, the play, the day's drive or 
sail. Nothing that can be imagined could be in stronger 
contrast with what we think of refugees, than the lux- 
ury and calm of such scene. 

Some of those present here are Englishmen and 
Americans, but many are of that persuasion which once 
cut so important a figure in the Rand, who were then, 
apparently, able to enjoy the society and companion- 



IDLERS AND MILLIONAIRES 73 

ship of all the others. To such a man I one day ex- 
pressed a rather slighting opinion of Johannesburg. 
Tears came to his eyes, and his voice thickened. 

'' I am a Cherman " said he, " und I haf lived in Eng- 
land, but what do 1 c/. for such places if I can live 
in Johannesburg, '"i " is de finest place in dis vorld, 
vhere ve hef de best s oziety, delufliest homes, de most 
wirtuous beople, und de habbiest dimes vot it is pos- 
sible to imachin. Shall I give you a picture of von 
home in Johannesbirg? 

" Veil, it is efening, und der friends of de family have 
come to de droring-room from a dinner vhich you 
can't beat for a sovereign a head in London. Dere is 
music by our daughters, and von of 'em is singing. 
Ve can't haf Patti every night, but you hear the sweet- 
est voices und der loveliest songs, und indellect is not 
missing. 

" Over in a corner a man speaks, berhaps, a leetle 
astronomy, vhile all ofer der room men and vimmen 
are discussing der latest literary dopics. Und, peside 
all dot, in a small room in der back of der house, a few 
friends amuse demselves mit cards." 

The more I think of that finished picture of " de 
best soziety and most wirtuous beople," the more I am 
astonished that we do not see a corps of millionaires 
arming and rushing north to wrest their little paradise 
from the Boers. 



CHAPTER VI 

CLIMATE AN^y ^t^"^FIRS 

To be perfectly happy in K ovember anywhere be- 
tween the Cape and the Zambesi, the traveller should 
take a fig-leaf for a daytime costume, and a Laplander's 
suit of furs for the night. 

I take off all that the law allows every day, and then 
gasp in the shade of my tent, but at night I do myself 
up in a lambswool wrapper, two ordinary blankets, and 
a steamer rug, and lie down to listen to the rattle of 
my teeth, until the sun begins to blaze through the 
canvas at daybreak. We who are at the headquarters 
at De Aar are having what the tradesmen would call a 
choice line of selected weather, every known kind 
coming in each twenty-four hours, and all served to us 
in wholesale lots. 

Often half a dozen sorts and degrees get mixed up. 
At such times we have a blistering sunshine with an 
Antarctic breeze blowing through it. Then on the top 
of that comes a Sudanese sandstorm made up of whirls 
that obscure the sun, and play the mischief with the 
camp, lifting up the skirts of the tents, and coating 
everything red. 
74 



CLIMATE AND KAFFIRS 75 

In one of these whirls you can lay a clean white 
handkerchief between two overcoats, and when you 
take it out it will look as if it had been soaked in beef- 
tea. After the dust whirl comes a tropical thunder 
shower, at the end of which the sun sets with a splen- 
dour no painter would dare try to put on canvas. As 
for the effect of the climate on man, it is not fair to say it 
is healthy, and let it go at that. If I may judge from 
this part of Cape Colony in November, it actually 
beats Colorado, in the United States. 

To go to Colorado you must be a millionaire with 
only one lung, and you must keep your lung, and part 
with your million. But here the rule is, to come pen- 
niless, with no lungs. Thus established, you develop 
new lungs, and become a millionaire. All the African 
millionaires started with neither money nor respiratory 
organs, and are now the most energetic, able-bodied men 
of business alive. Paul Kruger is an exception. He 
is having bad luck. But he began unfairly with sound 
lungs. 

We are on the edge of the Karroo Desert. It is a 
tract which looks like a rubbish-shooting ground of Im- 
perial size. It is everywhere rolling, and framed by 
great hills, except where the billows of baked and 
stony earth take the form of kopjes (called " coppies "), 
or small hills. The entire country is about equally 
spotted with small stones and little dry tufts of vege- 
tation, mainly sage brush. These are so bare and dry 



76 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

that they look like roots. The barren watercourses 
torture little trees to grow beside them, and these also 
are so bare and brown that they might as well be 
turned bottom upward. 

In every direction the view is unobstructed for 
miles, yet you see nothing but the same burnt desert 
with the hot air dancing over it. There are occasional 
little herds of goats tended by native children, but 
they never show until you are close upon them. The 
Karroo might well be a heaven for snakes, lizards, and 
beetles, but I saw none — nor any living thing except 
a few goats, a few stately ostriches, a few Kaffirs in 
rags or blankets, and one small black-and-white bird 
that would pass for an undersized magpie at home. 
Silence, solitude, desolation — multiply these a million- 
fold, and you have the Karroo. 

It is not w^ithout beauty, and it is not without a 
future. Everywhere, in everything, its colours are 
wondrous. Close at hand the hills are almost brick- 
red, a little farther away others are dove-coloured, 
while the farthest ones are of varying shades of purple. 
Tufts and splotches of vivid green appear wherever 
there is or has recently been water, and even the stones 
and shrubs are full of colour. 

I have said that the ground is stony. It is so stony 
that you cannot make up your mind whether the thin 
soil is being formed of disintegrating stones, or 
whether there once was a soil which has been washed 



CLIMATE AND KAFFIRS 77 

off down to the broken surface of the bed-rock. And 
yet man can do with it what the Mormons have done 
with the great American desert, now fast becoming a 
garden la^id. In some places the water is thirty feet 
below the surface ; in others fifteen hundred to two 
thousand feet — but there always is water, and once 
it bathes the surface it acts like a magician's wand. 

Whenever you see a railway station it is in an oasis 
of green, with willow and eucalyptus trees, flowers, 
and vegetables. Before I woke up one morning the 
train was at a place called Matjesfontein, and a man 
was calling out my name. When I was dressed and 
out on the platform I found that a Mr. J. D. Logan 
had heard I was passing through, and wished to invite 
me to breakfast. 

As I rubbed my eyes I saw far and away on every side 
the stony, tufted, shimmering desert, yet close beside 
me were tree-shaded cottages, with blooming gardens 
and lawns around each. Hurried away from the 
picturesque station to a handsome house, I found a 
luxuriously ordered table, smoking hot viands led off 
by salmon from England, with trained servants to add 
to comfort as abundant as any one could wish. 

This was Mr. Logan's village, and he is building a fine 
hotel as its chief glory. While we ate breakfast he 
dictated to his secretary letters of introduction to 
people further north, and before I finished my coffee 
the letters were handed to me type-written. When 



78 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

the train took me off Mr. Logan started on a shoot- 
ing trip. The whole episode was like a tatter of 
dreamland — a little spring of enterprise gushing out in 
the desert — and yet just the sort of thing ^one runs 
upon in South Africa. 

Close to every railway station, and hugging it for 
that companionship which all negroes love, are the 
huts of the Kaffirs. They are of every sort that costs 
no money and little labour. Some are holes in the 
earth roofed over with tin or tarpaulin, some are low 
huts of adobe (mud-brick) walls, some are made of that 
corrugated iron which is the eyesore of South Africa. 

There is not a thing about these Kaffirs, or their 
costumes, or their houses, that I have not noticed 
about the Guinea negroes of Mississippi, and the rest 
of the " black belt " of the United States. I begin to 
think with Burns that " a (black) man's a (black) man 
for a' that." Here and in America he is equally shift- 
less, equally ragged, equally jaunty in his rags, equally 
happy in his misfortunes, equally prone to lie in the 
sun, to laugh, to sing, and to pilfer. , 

One of the queerest things about the Kaffirs is that 
though there are milHons of them in South Africa, 
they make no mark on the landscape. They herd in 
little bands in the bushes, and by the stations and 
villages, and you never have the faintest notion of 
their numbers. 

The Government is hiring these blacks by the hun- 



CLIMATE AND KAFFIRS 79 

dreds at the advance camp at De Aar, and is paying 
them — what do you think!* Four pounds ten a 
month, with clothing, lodging, and food thrown in. 
It is past the comprehension of Tommy Atkins how 
such things can be, and I have heard the officers who 
distribute London-made clothing say that they wish 
they had as good garments for themselves. 

The reason for this treatment of the blacks is that 
they ask high wages, and are excellent drivers and 
transport men. It is also true that the British every- 
where demoralise the blacks with too generous treat- 
ment, which is as bad for them as Boer unkindness. 



CHAPTER VII 

NATAL AND LADYSMITH 

We have seen the circumstances in which the war 
opened, and under which the respective combatants 
prepared themselves for the encounter. The only or- 
ganised field force on the spot from the first was with 
General Sir George White, who had arrived at Durban 
from India on the 7th of October. His fourteen thou- 
sand troops were distributed between Pietermarltz- 
burg, Estcourt, Colenso, Ladysmith, and Glencoe, 
names which were unfamiliar at that time to the ma- 
jority of Englishmen, but are sadly familiar now. 

In his first despatch, General White records that, on 
the lOth of October, the Governor of Natal informed 
him of the ultimatum, and that an outbreak of war on 
the evening of the nth of October might be regarded 
as certain. It is not too much to say that the gallant 
general, even at that early period, regarded the mili- 
tary situation with dismay. 

He knew that the Boers and the Free Staters were 
massed on the frontiers, ready to descend upon the 
northern territory of Natal from the passes of the 
80 



NATAL AND LADYSMITH 8i 

Drakensberg mountains ; he knew also that, from a 
miHtary point of view, this northern department of 
Natal was untenable by the forces at his disposal. He 
therefore advised that a great portion of that territory 
should be abandoned, and we now know that he would 
have vacated the whole of the country to the north of 
the Tugela, had he not been overruled by political 
considerations. It is to this fatal error that most of 
our subsequent misfortunes are to be attributed. 

The Boers crossed the frontiers, both on the north 
and west, on the I2th of October, and next day the 
Transvaal flag was floating over Charlestown in Natal. 

The enemy came on in three columns. The main 
column, under General Joubert, occupied Newcastle, 
and then marched south. Viljoen's column cut the 
railway from Glencoe Junction to Ladysmithat Elands- 
laagte, and there took up a position. Lucas Meyer, 
with the third column, crossed the Buffalo, and 
marched westward on Dundee. 

Close to this, the centre of the coal mining of Natal, 
was Sir W. Penn Symons, with the i8th Hussars, a 
brigade division of Royal Artillery, the 1st Battalion 
Leicestershire Regiment and mounted infantry com- 
pany, the 1st Battalion King's Royal Rifles and 
mounted infantry company, the 2nd Battalion Royal 
Dublin Fusiliers and mounted infantry company, with 
details. In all about 3,500 men. Against him were 

gathered an unknown number of Boers. 
6 



82 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

It was afterwards learnt that, before delivering an 
attack, General Joubert intended to effect a junction 
with Lucas Meyer. General Symons, however, was 
prompt enough to counteract this plan. On the morning 
of the 20th of October he came so closely in touch 
with Meyer's column that hostilities were opened, and 
a general battle developed. The Boers occupied a 
strong position on Talana Hill, 5,000 yards from the 
British camp at Glencoe. 

The attack was opened by the Boers, who fired early 
on the morning of the 20th on a mounted infantry 
picket standing east of Dundee, at the junction of two 
roads from drifts across the Buffalo. Two hours after- 
wards, the British camp was not a little surprised by a 
shell which came thundering from the Boer lines. 

Sir William Symons does not seem to have known 
that the Boers had any artillery at all, whereas they 
had at least six guns. Their shells, however, buried 
themselves in the soft earth, and did not burst. 
Nevertheless, the Boer artillerymen made such excellent 
practice that Sir William Symons moved the majority 
of his troops out of the camp and advanced towards 
the enemy's position. 

The ground between the camp and the base of 
Talana Hill was of an open character, but the infantry, 
taking advantage of every variety of cover, managed 
to cross this space with only slight loss. 

Leading his men gallantly himself, Sir William 



NATAL AND LADYSMITH 83 

directed a fierce attack upon the hill, and was almost 
immediately mortally wounded. The infantry swept 
on, covered as far as possible by artillery, the men with 
the utmost resolution climbed the steep rocks on hands 
and knees, and, by one o'clock, had reached the crest 
and put the enemy to flight. About 500 Boers were 
killed and wounded ; while the British losses amounted 
to 10 officers and 31 non-commissioned officers and men 
killed; 20 officers and 160 non-commissioned officers 
and men wounded; and 9 officers and 211 non-com- 
missioned officers and men missing. 

The last Item needs some explanation. The i8th 
Hussars were ordered to move round the enemy's right 
flank, and be ready to cut off his retreat. In doing so 
they came in contact with General Joubert's column, 
were surrounded, taken prisoner, and forthwith de- 
spatched to Pretoria. This was a great damper on 
what at the time seemed to be a notable victory. 

Undaunted by his rebuff, General Joubert came 
steadily on, and General Yule, who succeeded Symons 
in command, saw that his position was becoming 
precarious. He communicated the fact to Sir George 
White at Ladysmith, and it was arranged that he should 
withdraw to that town as soon as possible. 

In the meantime the Boers had developed such sur- 
prising mobility, that Sir George White discovered 
them in the neighbourhood of Ladysmith itself. His 
cavalry patrols found them at Elandslaagte, clustered 



84 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

round the railway station. On the very day after the 
battle of Glencoe, therefore, the Commander-in-chief 
ordered General French, commanding the cavalry of 
the Natal force, to move out with a strong body of 
cavalry and artillery, followed by infantr3^ Thus was 
brought about the desperate battle of Elandslaagte, 
fought on October 2ist. 

General French had only arrived from England two 
days before, and at once commenced that career of 
almost uninterrupted success which has distinguished 
him above all the other leaders in the war. 

It was a drizzly, misty morning. The advance guard 
very soon came in touch with the enemy. Coming 
upon the edge of a cliff, they could see the Boers 
gathered round the station and settlement of Elands- 
laagte, and General French at once opened artillery 
fire upon them. The Boers replied with great accuracy, 
though again their shells did not burst, but merely 
buried themselves in the ground ; and then General 
French could see large bodies of mounted men coming 
up, apparently in support of the force he was attacking. 

Deeming it unadvisable to proceed further without 
reinforcements, he communicated by telephone with 
Sir George White, and received in return a squadron 
of the 5th Dragoon Guards, a squadron of the 5th 
Lancers, the 21st and 41st Batteries of the Royal Field 
Artillery, the ist Battalion of the Devonshire Regiment, 
and five companies of the Gordon Highlanders. More 



NATAL AND LADYSMITH 85 

artillery fighting took place, until at length the enemy's 
guns appeared to be silenced. 

There was not much daylight left, but General 
French decided to push his attack home. Again there 
were ridges to be scaled, and rocks to be climbed, but 
our men, led with the utmost bravery by their officers, 
headed forward in spite of the fact that by this time 
the enemy had been reinforced by the German con- 
tingent, who occupied a strong position upon a horse- 
shoe ridge. 

One incident is recorded by Sir George White in his 
official despatch, which afterwards was frequently re- 
peated. " Many of the Boers," he wrote, " remained 
lying down, shooting from behind stones until our 
men were within twenty or thirty yards of them, and 
then sometimes ran for it, and sometimes stood up 
and surrendered. These latter were never harmed, 
although just before their capture they had probably 
shot down several of our officers and men." 

Another still more disquieting and dishonourable 
incident is also recorded, namely the abuse of the 
white flag. Colonel Hamilton, on seeing this sacred 
emblem exhibited from the centre of the Boer camp, 
ordered the " cease fire " to be sounded. 

For a few moments there was a complete lull in the 
action. Then a single shot was heard, which was fol- 
lowed by a deadly fire from a small conical kopje, and 
by a determined charge up the hill by some thirty or 



86 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

forty Boers. Our men fell back for a moment before 
the fierce suddenness of this attack, but only for a 
moment. Reinforced by Devonshires, they charged 
back, cheering, to the crest of the hill, when the remnant 
of the Boer forces fled in confusion towards the north. 

The British troops had gained a conspicuous success, 
practically annihilating the whole of the Johannesburg 
commando. Many Boers of importance were killed, 
the whole of the enemy's camp was taken, and the 
burghers were thoroughly dispersed. It was a hardly 
contested fight ; the Boer losses were estimated at 
over lOO killed, io8 wounded, and i88 prisoners ; and 
they also lost two guns. Our casualties consisted of 4 
ofificers and 37 men killed, 31 officers and 175 wounded, 
and 10 men missing. 

This victory, though so dearly bought, had the hap- 
piest consequences. General Yule started on the 22nd 
for Ladysmith, leaving his sick and wounded behind. 
It was almost a forlorn venture, and would have been 
utterly so but for the battle of Elandslaagte. Even, 
however, after that crushing defeat had been inflicted 
on the enemy, who invested the country between Glen- 
coe and Ladysmith, the task which General Yule set 
himself was hazardous in the extreme. 

Sir George White, perceiving this risk, moved out 
again on October 24th and engaged the enemy at Riet- 
fontein, with a view to covering General Yule's flank. 
His object was attained with entire success, although 



NATAL AND LADYSMITH 8; 

with a loss of one British officer and eleven men killed, 
six officers and ninety-seven men wounded, and two 
missing. 

General Yule's column, after a march which will 
live as one of the most remarkable in military history, 
arrived at Ladysmith on October 25th without the loss 
of a man. 

From this point the course of the campaign was en- 
tirely dominated by the original decision to attempt to 
hold a large part of north Natal. In little more than 
a week the Boers had completely invested Ladysmith, 
isolating the large force of eight thousand men under 
the command of Sir George White and General Yule, 
and, of course, closing communications with the south 
of Natal. 

What is known as the siege of Ladysmith actually 
commenced sometime later ; but there is no doubt 
that immediately after General Yule had joined hands 
with Sir George White the two were rendered abso- 
lutely ineffective for driving out the invaders. 

Their position was unenviable, but by no means 
desperate. The camp had been skilfully entrenched, 
and contained abundance of ammunition and provi- 
sions, while the Klip River assured to the besieged an 
ample supply of water. Still, it is hardly congenial to 
the British spirit to be hemmed in and rendered help- 
less for any lengthened period, and almost from the 
day the investment began General White was unceas- 



88 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

ing in his efforts to injure the enemy, and to break 
loose from him. Disastrous results followed upon one 
such effort, however, on the last day of October. 

Colonel Carleton, with the Gloucesters, Royal Irish 
Fusiliers, and a Mountain Battery, had been ordered 
out by night, with the view of turning the enemy's 
right flank. This was part of a movement which was 
soundly enough conceived, but which ended in a ter- 
rible reverse. While Colonel Carleton was making his 
way over a ridge called Nicholson's Nek, some boulders 
fell, or were thrown, from the heights above, and 
frightened the mules that were carrying the whole of 
the gun equipment, and the greater part of the small- 
arm ammunition. The animals stampeded, and in a 
very few moments the whole force found itself left de- 
fenceless, except for the cartridges the soldiers carried 
with them. 

Not only was the force defenceless, but it seems to 
have been thrown into a state of semi-panic. The 
men were standing on a flat kopje, situated among 
other kopjes which dominated it. Realising the des- 
perate nature of their position, the men rallied, and 
commenced building breast-works with such boulders 
as were not too large to move. 

They had only partially succeeded in protecting 
themselves, when the enemy appeared in great force. 
It is not difficult to imagine the scene that followed. It 
was pitch dark ; our men had very soon discharged 



NATAL AND LADYSMITH 89 

their last cartridge, and there was nothing left but to 
face the Boers with the bayonet, and with the grim 
determination to sell their lives as dearly as possible. 

But now occurred perhaps the most singular incident 
of that dreadful night. Some one was heard to give 
the order to " cease fire." Whether it was done by 
one of our officers under the impression that nearly all 
the brave little band had been slain, and that, there 
being no more ammunition, further resistance was use- 
less ; or whether, as is not improbable, the order was 
shouted by some one among the enemy, in pursuance 
of a trick by which, in this campaign, the Dutchmen 
have won several advantages over us, will never be 
known ; but, at all events, this fine body of men fell 
hopelessly into the hands of the enemy. 

They sold their lives and liberty dearly, but they 
suffered complete annihilation as a fighting body, and, 
in addition to a number of casualties, no fewer than 
eight hundred and seventy officers and men were taken 
prisoner. 

In reporting this reverse, Sir George White gave an 
example of chivalrous acceptance of responsibility, 
which deserves to be especially recorded. He tele- 
graphed, " I formed the plan in carrying out which the 
disaster occurred, and am alone responsible for that 
plan. No blame whatever attaches to the troops, as 
the position was untenable." 

These were assuredly the words of a brave man, and 



90 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

they earned for him the sympathy of the entire nation. 
It was a sad blow, both to our material power and to our 
prestige, but, fortunately, Sir George White was able 
to assure us that it in no way affected the course of the 
campaign, or lessened the security of Ladysmith. 

Then the lines of investment were drawn closer and 
tighter than ever round the town. The Boers posted 
heavy guns on all the hills surrounding the extensive 
plain upon which Ladysmith stands, and where the 
camp was formed, and occupied in strong force all the 
valleys between them. 

The greatest anxiety prevailed in England as to 
whether or not Sir George White could hold out until 
Sir Redvers Buller and his reinforcements could arrive. 
It so happened that General Buller landed at Capetown 
on the very day of the Nicholson's Nek disaster. He 
received the news as he stepped ashore, and probablj' 
at that moment he made up his mind that the relief oi 
Ladysmith was a matter of the first necessity. 

We can understand now how disastrously the original 
military blunder made in northern Natal continued 
persistently to make its evil effects felt, just as ripples 
spread in ever-widening circles round the stone cast 
into a pool. The arrival of the Army Corps was now 
the one thing to look for, and everybody was asking, 
" What will General Buller do with it ? " 

It was understood that Buller's plan was to take his 
troops northwards through Cape Colony, and invade 



NATAL AND LADYSMITH 91 

the Orange Free State. Had this plan been followed, 
it would probably have paralysed the enemy, and led 
to the shortening of the campaign. But General BuUer 
felt certain that the situation in Natal was intolerable ; 
that the first thing to do was to relieve Ladysmith ; 
and that, for the present at all events, the original plan 
of campaign must be abandoned. 

It will thus be seen how the initial mistake made in 
Natal has affected the whole of the war ever since. 
General Buller ordered the transports to Durban, and 
poured his troops into that port, himself following in 
due time. Altogether, sixteen thousand men were 
diverted to Natal. General Gatacre took a strong 
force to Queenstown, and the remainder, under Lord 
Methuen, were despatched to the relief of Kimberley, 
which was already closely besieged. 

Thus three campaigns were developed instead of 
one, and the British forces were divided between 
Natal, the northern frontier of Cape Colony, and the 
western border of the Orange Free State. From a 
strategical point of view nothing could have been 
worse, and, although all went well for a few days, the 
country was soon to learn with bitterness that a fatal 
error had been committed, the effects of which would 
be felt throughout the whole struggle. 

With Buller's arrival in Natal, the hopes both of 
the army and the nation rose considerably. There 
were some regrettable incidents round Ladysmith, such 



92 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

as the destruction of a British armoured train near 
Chieveley ; the depredations of the Boers along the 
banks of the Tugela River ; the isolation of Estcourt, 
and so forth. On the other hand, General Hildyard, 
on the 23rd of November, fought a successful action at 
Willow Grange against more than seven thousand 
Boers, commanded by Joubert in person. 

General Buller reported that this action resulted in 
a strategical success of the greatest value, and it was 
purchased at no considerable loss of life. At the same 
time General White found it utterly hopeless to en- 
deavour to break through the Boer line, suffered from 
a daily bombardment, and was greatly troubled by in- 
creasing sickness, both among the soldiers and civilians, 
in the camp and town. 

The relief of Ladysmith became urgently necessary, 
and everyone anxiously looked forward to some deci- 
sive action by Buller. Two days after the affair at 
Willow Grange Sir Redvers arrived at Frere, about 
twelve miles south of the town of Colenso on the 
Tugela. The Boers had destroyed the bridges over 
this important river, and had entrenched themselves 
on the steep and stony sides forming the north bank. 
The problem before Buller was how to cross the river, 
and break down the Boer investing lines around Lady- 
smith. This was the work which he took in hand 
immediately on his arrival. 

By the middle of December his preparations began 



NATAL AND LADYSMITH 93 

to near completion, but dark days were in store for us 
just then. This was the week which saw the fright- 
ful disaster to Gatacre's army at Stormberg, and the 
repulse of Lord Methuen at Maaghersfontein. The 
trilogy of disaster was soon to be completed by the 
failure of General Buller at Colenso. 

On the 15th of December he delivered his blow, but 
the position was found impregnable ; our men were 
shot down by hundreds by an invisible enemy ; many 
were drowned in the stream ; the artillery came within 
rifle range, and had all its horses, and nearly all its 
men, killed or wounded ; and, after a stubborn fight, 
in which we lost eleven hundred men wounded or 
prisoners, the order was given to retire. Buller re- 
ported that no troops could live in the open against 
such murderous fire. 

Eight of our guns were abandoned, and General 
BuUer's first attempt to relieve Ladysmith had failed, 
and failed utterly. 

The Government at home now woke up to the criti- 
cal nature and requirements of the situation. Lord 
Roberts was asked to take the chief command in 
South Africa, and consented. Lord Kitchener was 
appointed his chief of the staff. He was then at 
Khartoum, but he straightway started for the scene 
of action, and joined Lord Roberts at Gibraltar. An- 
other army corps was ordered to be mobilised ; more 
reserves were called out ; other bodies of men were 



94 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

raised from the Militia, Yeomanry, and Volunteers ; 
our Colonies promised further contingents ; and the 
whole Empire awoke to its responsibilities. 

By the end of the year the forces raised for pur- 
poses of war numbered no fewer than one hundred 
and twenty thousand men, and forty thousand more 
were added before many weeks had passed. 

General Buller, after his reverse, rested his men and 
waited for reinforcements. Meanwhile he got into 
heHographic communication with General White, who 
reported, at the beginning of January, that he was 
very hard pressed. The Boers had made a terrific 
assault upon him, and had only been repelled after 
nearly seventeen hours' fighting. 

Some of the entrenchments on Waggon Hill were 
three times carried, and as often retaken by our troops. 
The enemy was finally repulsed and driven out of our 
positions at the point of the bayonet. Clearly Buller 
must strike quickly, and strike hard, if Ladysmith 
was to be saved. 

His reinforcements, under Sir Charles Warren, duly 
arrived, and he had been strengthened in artillery. 

At last the cheering news came from his head- 
quarters, on the 17th of January, that he had crossed 
the Tugela, practically without opposition, and oc- 
cupied a strong position on the northern bank. 

Several subsidiary actions followed, in which Lord 
Dundonald's mounted men, General Clery with a part 



NATAL AND LADYSMITH 95 

of Warren's force, and General Lyttelton were engaged. 
The Boers evacuated their trenches, and they were 
occupied by the British. On the night of Tuesday, 
January 23rd, Sir Charles Warren captured an important 
hill known as Spion Kop, which was believed to 
dominate the Boer position. In fact. General Buller 
telegraphed — " Warren is of opinion that he has 
rendered the Boer position untenable." 

There were heavy losses in these operations — mostly 
in wounded — but it was felt that a very sensible advance 
had been made towards the great object in view. 
What, therefore, was the dismay of the public when 
it learned on the following day that Spion Kop, which 
had been wrested from the Boers at so heavy a cost, 
had been abandoned. The fact was that the Boers 
poured upon it so terrific an artillery fire that no 
troops could stay there and live. 

Then came the still more disquieting and bewildering 
intelligence that Buller had re-crossed the Tugela and 
established himself in the camp he had occupied a 
month before. His second attempt to relieve Lady- 
smith, like the first, had failed. 

A third move was made on February 5th. This 
time, Buller tried a double movement. On the front 
of the position a feint was made, while on the extreme 
right General Lyttelton's Brigade effected the passage 
of the river, surprised the enemy, and captured a hill 
forming part of the Brakfontein Range. Here again, 



96 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

however, as at Spion Kop, the gain proved to be 
illusory, and once more, on the 8th of February, 
Buller retired across the Tugela. 

It was impossible, he said, to entrench himself on 
the north bank, owing to the nature of the ground. 
He spent two days in trying to do so, but merely 
found that he was exposing his men to heavy guns 
fired from positions by which the British artillery was 
dominated. The third attempt had failed also. 



CHAPTER VIII 

AT SIR REDVERS BULLER'S HEADQUARTERS 

All who were at De Aar early in November 1899, 
felt that they were occupying ground which was soon 
to become historic. Battles come more or less as light- 
ning strikes, but in this case the great treasury of 
military stores which was accumulating there neces- 
sitated a concentration of force at this point, and such 
a combination must sooner or later attract the enemy. 

This was not the sort of fighting-ground he is wont 
to choose, for we were in a wide level basin, whose 
hilly walls are very low and smooth, but we felt that 
he must come, because we menaced his frontier si'^cty 
miles away, and tempted him with such an amount of 
stores, guns, and ammunition as would enable him to 
prolong his warfare at least two months longer than 
his own resources would permit. 

Every day that the Boers still delayed our camp 
grew stronger, though this was not the case before 
General Buller arrived at the Cape. Until then we 
had only the second battalion of the Yorkshire Light 
Infantry to protect half a million pounds' worth of 
7 97 



98 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

stores, but within forty-eight hours a battery and a 
half of artillery had arrived from England, to be 
followed by another half-battery from the Orange 
River. 

Rumours of Boers in the neighbourhood, or crossing 
the river at various points, caused the officers to sleep 
in their boots at times, but all now felt better prepared, 
and even stories of attacks on the railway between us 
and the Cape caused only a thrill of pleasurable antici- 
pation. 

The British base of supplies was at Stellenbosch, near 
Capetown, with De Aar as the advanced post. The 
two formed, as it were, an arm, with the elbow at the 
Cape and the wrist at De Aar. In time, as the army 
pushed forward, it was proposed to build other advance 
posts farther north, and spread apart like the opened 
fingers of a hand. It was of intense interest to see a 
great post like this — a mushroom military capital — 
spring up much faster than weeds ever grow. 

Five weeks before this was a village of some forty 
houses, two general merchandise shops, a church or 
two, a school, and a railway men's institute, or club- 
house. It had now become a railway junction where 
the trains from the Cape were broken up to reach the 
Natal coast on the east, and the Orange River, Johan- 
nesburg, Sic, on the north. The villagers were the 
railway employes. All around the little bunch of 
cottages reached a great level desert plain tufted with 



AT BULLER'S HEADQUARTERS 99 

wild sage. Large, smooth, table-topped kopjes en- 
closed the plain on the north-east and east, and low, 
sharp-edged hills made its western walls. 

A fortnight after war had begun some officers of 
engineers received orders to make a camp here, and 
put up buildings for ammunition and stores. They 
found a railway pointsman's iron-roofed cottage, and 
some sheep at pasture, where they determined to 
begin work. The pointsman's house became the mess, 
or dining-room, of the officers. Fastidious as many 
are at home, they now put up with enamelled iron 
plates, sat on stools and soap-boxes, and fared upon 
army rations of so much meat, so much bread, such a 
weight of potatoes, and so much mustard, pepper, and 
salt apiece. For glasses they had enamelled iron 
mugs, and their knives and forks would cost twopence 
or threepence each in London. 

Where they found the sheep at pasture there sprang 
up a canvas camp, three or four large store tents such 
as circus side-shows use in England, and a number of 
large wooden buildings framed with corrugated iron, 
and filled with food for men and horses, ammunition, 
and the essentials of warfare and soldier existence. 
Planted on the pasture, too, was a great kraal full of 
new transport waggons, carts, and carriages — by the 
hundred. 

A week after the engineers began work Captain 
Mackenzie, of the Royal Artillery, who had been in 



100 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

the Free State buying horses, had orders to set up a 
remount office at this place for the purchase of horses 
and mules, and to establish a kraal for the animals. 
He bought, or leased, a piece of ground to accommo- 
date a hundred beasts. Ever since then he had been 
leasing more and more land, until his camp kraals 
extended for at least a mile. 

An outer kraal had been established in the near dis- 
tance, and he had already a thousand or more mules, 
and hundreds of horses, while strings of valuable beasts 
were coming in every day. Next to his Remount 
Camp was the Army Service Camp, and next to that 
the Medical Camp, with its Red Cross flag flapping 
from a pole. On the other side of the railway were 
the quarters of the Royal Engineers, the Artillery, 
and the Yorkshire Regiment. Far off, behind every- 
thing else, stretched the largest of these canvas villages 
— the Kaffir camp, where live the Kaffirs, Cape boys, 
and Basutos who are clothed, fed, housed, and paid so 
highly for their work as mule drivers and transport 
men. 

Scattered about in and between these camps were 
new iron-sheathed storehouses, and the bowery en- 
closure which holds the cottage chosen for Sir Red- 
vers Buller's headquarters. This juts out into the 
desert tract, a refreshing green oasis, whose air is 
cooled by the shade of many trees, and scented by the 
perfume of honeysuckle. 



AT BULLER'S HEADQUARTERS loi 

The rapid and masterly construction of store-sheds 
was a source of constant interest and wonder to us 
civilians. On one morning we saw men laying a lot 
of floor timbers on the ground. By nightfall the 
framework of a building had sprung up around the 
beams, and in twenty-four hours men were sheathing 
the framework with iron, while others were building 
inner walls, with counters, lockers, and shelves com- 
plete. In this way, as by magic, we came upon a 
soldiers* canteen or a fifty-feet storehouse, across a 
path over which we had walked to the village on the 
previous day. 

Most men know the extreme importance of the 
Army Service Corps in modern military affairs. In 
the Omdurman campaign, for instance. Lord Kitch- 
ener's genius was shown in the use he made of this 
body, and of the Engineers and Ordnance Corps. He 
was thus enabled to carry an army perpetually equipped, 
and wanting nothing, straight to the battle-field, where 
the combatant force did its decisive work in a day. 

Everything seemed to promise that the work in this 
Boer campaign would be the same, as one began to 
realise what a perfectly complete organisation is this 
Army Service Corps, in which every private has a trade 
and is skilled at it. Here were carpenters, builders, 
railway clerks, smiths, wheelwrights, harness makers, 
joiners — every sort of mechanic and workman. They 
were up at bugle call at daybreak, and worked like 



102 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

beavers until six o'clock in the evening. They could 
make you a waggon, or a saddle, or a cabinet ; I almost 
think they could mend a watch, or build a bicycle. 

They are trained to run a railway after the engi- 
neers have built it, and we had the Ordnance Corps 
here to supply clothing and arms, the medical men for 
doctors, the engineers for sanitation, and all of them 
together as warriors. In a word, De Aar was a com- 
plete city except for jewellers, milliners, and dress- 
makers, and if it was to be permanent we had the 
means to turn its canvas tents into stone houses, and 
its desert trails into paved streets. 

All this was the civil aspect of the camp as a base of 
supplies. But the military who ruled and guarded it 
were quite as active. They had dotted the hills with 
breastworks, thrown up redoubts of earth or stone or 
provender boxes on the plain, and spent their own 
busy days in drilling, gun firing, and hill climbing, 
while our corps of scouts had been ranging all over 
the adjacent country. 

Meantime our natives had been invaluable. They 
had fed and groomed the horses, and trained the mules 
in ten-span teams to drag the heavy transport waggons 
up and down the roads in clouds of dust from morning 
until night. Capetown at night is a most exciting 
city. De Aar by day and night was almost as excit- 
ing, and a thousand times more novel. 



CHAPTER IX 

THE SITUATION AT DE AAR 

Very striking was the extreme youth of De Aar, 
this important point in the military programme of 
the war, and its amazing growth. What was desert 
ground, harbouring a few sheep, less than five weeks 
before, rapidly became the seat of five camps surround- 
ing half a million pounds* worth of stores. How it 
would spread, how it would look, what would be its 
insurable value, inside of three weeks, when tens of 
thousands of troops were there, the mind hesitated to 
picture, or even to surmise. 

At first it was quite common to hear casual remarks 
by officers to the effect that artillery were needed here, 
and that perfect protection required mounted infantry. 
Such comments were so often made that, as soon as 
the value of the stores was estimated at half a million 
pounds I took the trouble to inquire exactly what pro- 
tection the camp enjoyed, and found that of regular 
troops there were none but the 2nd Battalion (Col. 
Barter's) King's Own Yorkshire Light Infantry, num- 
bering about eight hundred men. 

103 



I04 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

There were two guns — one a muzzle-loader, and one 
a Hotchkiss — which were intended for Kimberley, but 
were stopped here because Kimberley was cut off from 
communication. To be sure there were the men of the 
Army Service Corps and of the Royal Engineers, 
numbering 125 more combatants, making less than a 
thousand fighting men in all, with two guns. In 
other words, until four days ago, one thousand men 
here were under sentence of death, or ignominious sur- 
render, whenever the Boers should have chosen to 
deliver judgment. 

Fancy a capital " O " split apart at the top and bot- 
tom. Fancy the letter made by hills, and the space 
between a wide, long, level tract of sage-brush and 
sand, with the Cape lying at the further end of hun- 
dreds of miles of desert. Fancy the Orange River 
sixty miles away, with two thousand five hundred men 
holding the bridge over it, and a battalion of one 
thousand men broken into five bodies of troops iso- 
lated at as many points — all, except the force at the 
Orange River, inviting certain destruction. Remem- 
ber, too, that not only the Boers of the Free State 
and the Transvaal were to be feared, for we were in 
an enemy's country, to all intents and purposes. This 
is the Cape Colony of Great Britain ; but it is, in the 
spirit of the majority of its inhabitants, not to be likened, 
thank Heaven, to any other of her Majesty's colonies. 

Were the hills around De Aar held by our troops 



THE SITUATION AT DE AAR 105 

and fortified ? The farthest ones — to the eastward — 
were. The nearer ones, dominated by a magnificent 
elevation from which shot could have been fired into 
this camp from mediaeval guns of wood, were left open 
to any who might choose to take and intrench them. 
This, then, was the predicament of De Aar at the be- 
ginning of the Boer rebellion. Every man there daily 
expected attack, and no one but the Omniscient Ruler 
of all destinies can conceive why an attack was not made. 

As the time went on, however, the situation im- 
proved. General Sir Redvers Buller's arrival at Cape- 
town was followed by the abandonment of Colesburg 
and Naauwpoort, two of the many villages in which 
small forces had been kept at the mercy of the Boers. 
The concentration of these troops at this point im- 
mediately succeeded, and we gained a battery and a 
half (nine guns of the latest pattern), and four hun- 
dred men of the Berkshire Regiment. 

Major-General Wood of the Engineers, arrived at 
about the same time, r. d instantly the commanding 
hills to the west, close) overlooking the camp, bristled 
with men digging f .itrenchments and erecting de- 
fences for rifle fire and guns. 

These opportune changes distinctly encouraged the 
brave fellows entrusted with the care and accumula- 
tion of stores for the many regiments which were to 
come, and which were to advance from here for the 
prompt settlement of this war. 



io6 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

At least two thousand strong in combatant force, 
we had something like a dozen guns, with the hills 
fortified and manned by day and night. We formed 
redoubts of earth, of forage, and of biscuit boxes, as 
well as many trenches on the level ground between 
the hills. We could sleep with the consciousness that 
we were able to make a stifT opposition to the enemy, 
though we still needed mounted infantry. If we had 
such a force, and three thousand more fighting men, 
we might have the sweeter assurance of not being 
compelled to suffer very great slaughter, or submit to 
the necessity of surrendering these stores, which 
would prolong the war against us for weeks were they 
to fall into the enemy's hands. Thus we were thank- 
ful for many things, among them being the knowledge 
that the precarious past was gone by, that the Boers 
had missed their best chance, and that we could give 
a good account of ourselves when those hovering 
round should call us into battle. 

We had another change which chimed in well with 
the improvement of our defences — we were put under 
martial law. What this form of government entails 
will be understood from the following copy of the reg- 
ulations posted up at the station and the post-office : — 

1. Martial law has been proclaimed in De Aar. 
The following camp regulations will come into imme- 
diate operation : 

2. No person is allowed to remain in or to quit De 



THE SITUATION AT DE AAR 107 

Aar without a permit signed by the magistrate, and 
countersigned by the camp commandant. 

3. The permits for railway officials [this is a railway 
centre] will be signed and issued by the heads of the 
traffic, loco, and engineering departments ; for postal 
officials by the head of that department. 

4. Any person found selling intoxicating liquor to a 
soldier, or to a native or coloured person, will be im- 
mediately apprehended, and the whole of his goods 
seized. 

5. The sale of intoxicating liquor to others can only 
take place between the hours of 11 a.m. and 6 p.m. 
This includes the sale of liquor to persons staying in 
any hotel or boarding-house in De Aar. 

6. Every person keeping house or a boarding-house, 
or receiving any one into his private house to stay for 
one night or more, is required to obtain the permission 
of the camp commandant before doing so. 

7. No person other than railway and postal officials 
will be allowed, without a special pass, out of their 
houses after half-past 9 p.m. 

8. Any person infringing these regulations will be 
dealt with by martial law. 

This proclamation was ordered by the Major-Gen- 
eral commanding, and thus a very necessary change, 
tending to exclude Boer sympathisers from the camp, 
also dated from the arrival of General Buller and the 
instalment here of Major-General Wood, 



CHAPTER X 

HEADQUARTERS DURING A BATTLE 

The very mechanical routine of life at an advance 
post like De Aar, where a few troops simply hold 
stores for others who are to come, grows almost as 
tiresome as watching the sails of a windmill for days 
at a time. So I ran down to Orange River, sixty 
miles, and was rewarded by scenting the first aroma of 
battle on this side of the seat of war. 

My idea was simply to see this outpost on the fron- 
tier, to walk over into the enemy's country if possible, 
and to compass the place in my mind's eye, in order 
to understand whatever might happen there in days 
to come. 

A friend who knew Colonel the Hon. G. H. Gough 

went with me early in November to pay his respects 

to the commandant. The same veldt reaches all the 

way from De Aar to the river — a plain littered with 

tufts of wild sage and pimpled with hills, some large 

as forty Olympias in a row, and cut off flat on their 

tops ; others mere bosoms of the plain, smooth and 

gracefully rounded. But the sage grew greener and 
io8 



HEADQUARTERS DURING A BATTLE 109 

greener, and there was grass in places, varied by occa- 
sional oases of little light-green trees surrounding a 
farmhouse, or an artificial pond fed by a Yankee wind 
pump. 

Field rats and mice, lizards, chameleons, and an 
occasional large bird scuttled out of sight ; frequent 
ant-hills, two or three feet high and half as thick, 
dotted the veldt with their brick-red colour, and 
we saw a few stately ostriches, and many herds of 
goats, sheep, and horses. Of human inhabitants there 
were only tiny clusters at the far-separated stations. 
Silence, desolation, vastness, and colour — these were 
the dominant notes of the region. 

Not many weeks before, Orange River consisted of 
a few railway buildings, and six or eight small stone 
cottages roofed with corrugated iron — the homes of 
the railway people. It may have had a fixed popula- 
tion of fifty souls. Now 2,650 soldiers and half as 
many more servants, drivers, transport hands, and 
camp followers made the little village swarm and hum 
with life. The station platform was crowded by 
soldiers, armed and in full marching order, hung all 
about with heavy weights, like hooks in a crowded 
butcher's shop. 

It is indeed a marvel that Englishmen can go about 
so buttoned up, and strapped in, and burdened with 
equipage, in the intense heat of these latitudes. 

Leaving the station we saw tents pitched along one 



no TOWARDS PRETORIA 

side of the only street, and other tents standing in the 
humorous Httle front gardens, where plants and flowers 
are kept in parafBn and biscuit tins, as though the 
people expected to move at short notice, and carry 
their gardens with them. 

The horses of the officers were tethered to the front 
fences, and in the middle of the street was a group of 
soldiers working a heliograph — a mirror, like a shaving- 
glass, set up on a tripod, and trembling with the deft 
touches that one soldier gave to a telegraph key, the 
while another soldier read to him from a sheet of 
paper. 

Little did we suspect that, as we watched that 
mirror, it was communicating the orders of General 
Wood to a British force at that moment entering into 
an engagement with the Boers twenty miles away. 

Having seen the town we inquired for Colonel Gough, 
and learned that he was out with a patrol across 
the river, and would return in an hour. We knew that 
earlier in the week a small force had been riding in a 
south-easterly direction in the enemy's country, and 
had returned quickly without an adventure. So, there 
being nothing new in this situation, we sat down to 
await the return of the seven hundred Lancers and 
others who were under Colonel Gough. 

It was one o'clock in the afternoon, and we had 
been smoking and chatting with new military acquaint- 
ances for an hour or so, when we noticed a group of 



HEADQUARTERS DURING A BATTLE iii 

Tommies standing behind two officers, who were 
scanning the distant veldt with field glasses. Going 
into the street to see what they were looking at, we 
discovered that of the few persons to be seen every 
one was facing and scanning the red-hot veldt — even 
the Kaffirs and their women and children being outside 
their huts in the foreground, with their palms up to 
shield their eyes. Of soldiers there were not twenty 
within sight. What did it mean ? What had happened 
to depopulate a swarming village in an hour ? 

It was the hostler to Captain Wright, the local cor- 
respondent of the Daily Mail, who answered the ques- 
tion — perhaps with exaggeration, yet in such a manner 
as to show that no time was to be lost by any energetic 
man at the scene. " We have heard that the patrolis 
cut off by a large force of Boers," said he, *' and every 
man-jack in the place — field batteries, infantry, and all 
— has gone to their relief in the train." 

" When did the patrol start out ? " 

" Yesterday, sir. They're at Belmont now, twenty 
miles away. I wish I was with them. God send that 
they'll give the Dutch what they're in need of." 

" Where is Major-General Wood, to give us permis- 
sion to hurry after the troops ? " 

'* In the station, sir." 

And there we found him — a small, well-knit, wiry 
man of apparently sixty, black haired, slightly bald, 
swarthy, alone in the dining-room, with his sword and 



112 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

belt flung upon a table, a thousand flies inspecting it, 
his head held down in thought, his visage that of a 
man preoccupied and anxious. 

*' I'd rather you'd see Colonel Money," said he ; 
" he is acting commandant in Colonel Gough's absence." 

In a tiny stone cottage with " Staff Office " on a 
painted board before it, we found Colonel Money, of 
the " Fighting Fifth " (Northumberland Fusiliers), 
who have been under canvas two years, and have seen 
Gibraltar, Omdurman, Crete, and Aldershot, yet have 
known the comforts of a bed at night for only two 
weeks since 1897. 

We saw him in what was somebody's bedroom only 
a few weeks before, sitting at a table made of planks 
laid upon wooden trestles, and in three minutes we 
were trudging along the railway to the river. The 
fringe of bright green trees, like willows at home, 
showed us where it was, a mile and a half away, but 
the route was between hills on and around all of which 
were white tents, or camps, upon the veldt. On one 
hill a man was wig-wagging with flags, on another a 
" helio " was making microscopic lightning flashes, on 
another men in khaki lounged among rocks scarcely 
more plentiful than themselves. 

At last the land fell away, and a great iron bridge, 
painted red, took the place of the railway. When the 
river is swollen this great bridge is doubtless needed 
to span it, but now two-thirds of its length arched a 



HEADQUARTERS DURING A BATTLE 113 

field of dry caked mud, from which on all sides sprang 
a myriad trees and bushes. A sentinel on foot, backed 
by many men lounging near, demanded our passes, 
and permitted us to continue across the bridge, once 
but partially floored with open trestle work, but now 
covered with planks for the passage of troops. 

From its middle we were able to look up and down 
the historic Orange River. The water in it was not 
above 75 feet wide, and looked very shallow. In 
character it was like the Missouri or Lower Mississippi, 
bordered by a wide, dry bed, cut up by little islands 
and sand-bars, and fretted by upturned trees, snags, 
and sun-baked debris. Far off to the west its banks 
came closer together, and were so clothed with green 
that for a moment we drank in that view, and thought 
of the Thames at Wargrave. 

At the far end of the red series of trusses a corporal 
and squad of men suddenly materialised, and demanded 
our passes very much as if we had not passed through 
the other end of the bridge, but had been born in the 
middle of it, and had stayed there till we grew to 
formidable proportions. 

Before us, instead of the veldt, were some consider- 
able hills, so stony as to appear like huge heaps of 
black boulders, with the shining metals of the railway 
dodging between and around them. 

" Go up on that hill," said the corporal, " and, may- 
be, you will see the fighting. I wish to goodness I 
8 



114 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

was in the middle of it, instead of being stuck here 
like a cast-off shoe ! " 

We passed out of the tunnel of red iron frame-work, 
and on both sides of us were men of the Fusiliers and 
the Munsters, alert, rifles in hand, peering between the 
rocks and bushes, and ready to give and take the 
sharp medicine of war. 



CHAPTER XI 

BATTLE CONDITIONS ON THE VELDT 

The force in the field was simply a patrol of seven 
hundred men, composed of Mounted Infantry of the 
Royal Munster Fusiliers, the Northumberland Fusi- 
liers, and the North Lancashire Regiment, acting with 
the 9th Lancers. These were under the command of 
Colonel Gough, and had been out in the enemy's 
country thirty hours when news reached this post that 
they were attacking a Boer commando. 

I crossed the Orange River and climbed the highest 
kopje, to find that its sides were covered with troops. 
At the top stood three officers and a dozen men, all 
silent, all staring over the veldt which lay stretched 
beneath and before them five hundred feet below, fif- 
teen miles to some eastern hills, and interminably 
level to the westward. They were listening as well as 
looking, hoping to hear the low mutter of the guns of 
the Boers answered by their comrades wherever they 
might be. 

The crest was battlemented by boulders as high as 
a man's breast, and all along the top of the wall were 

115 



ii6 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

dirty canvas bags filled with sand. The officers used 
field glasses. The soldiers strained their eyes. In a few- 
whispered words I was made to understand that Colo- 
nel Gough's patrol force was supposed to be on the 
other side of a pass plainly visible to the north-east- 
ward, and that the armoured train, and other railway 
trains, had taken to his relief practically all the artillery 
and infantry that he had left behind at the post. 

All on the redoubt were now scanning the rough 
veldt and its enclosing hills for signs of our own forces, 
or of possible Boer commandoes concentrating for an 
attack on the post, that is to say the Orange River 
bridge, behind us. 

The officer in command of the redoubt was Major 
Hall, of the Royal Munster Fusiliers, and a finer 
picture of the swell, the gentleman, and the soldier I 
have never seen. His uniform of khaki was new, from 
his helmet to the creaseless leather putties which 
seemed moulded to his legs. 

It all fitted him to perfection, and every star and 
button and buckle shone like fine jewellery. His face 
was refined, intellectual, masterful, and his every 
movement, graceful to a degree, showed him as much 
at his ease on that redoubt as in a West-end drawing 
room at home. Indeed, with his moustachios up- 
turned at the ends, and his face and hands browned 
but daintily cared for, he might have been carried to 
London on a magic carpet, manifesting there as he 



BATTLE CONDITIONS ON THE VELDT 117 

did in war, "the glass of fashion and the mould of 
form." 

Now he leaned on the parapet, now he sat upon it, 
now he slid over it and leaned his back against it, but 
all the time he scanned the field or received or sent 
despatches through an urchin-faced orderly of seven- 
teen, who was himself a keen soldier to the core. 

The officers with the major were but a trifle less 
spick and span than their chief. The soldiers were 
what one would expect who knows the dust they had 
marched through, the rocks they had lain among — the 
exigencies of their routine of living sixteen in one tent. 

Sv/eeping the field with my glasses I discovered — 
only by intense concentration — that a distant hill 
was crowded with our men in khaki, and first saw such 
of their horses as were white or extra dark. Their 
cannon — three of which were with them and painted 
light brown — were not visible, so wonderfully does the 
khaki colour merge into the tints of the sun-browned 
veldt. 

While I ranged the valley or plain with my glasses 
something slipped and stumbled heavily over the 
loose stones behind me. I turned, thinking to dodge 
or help a stumbling man, and found myself staring 
into the great brown eyes of an ostrich 6 ft. tall, and 
with legs almost as thick as, and longer than, my 
own. 

" He came up here some days ago," said a soldier, 



Ii8 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

" and he always stays here now. We feed him and 
fool with him, and he seems very happy." 

The ostrich stalked past me, and took a position be- 
tween the major and the captain, where, after appear- 
ing to observe that they were very busy scanning the 
landscape, he too stared at the plain, and remained 
erect and watchful, the highest typification of a sentry 
in appearance. He marred this fine effect for just a 
moment by seizing and swallowing a box of safety 
matches. After that he continued his sentry duty 
with a gleam of satisfaction in his eyes. 

We saw but little to reward us, and nothing to put 
us more upon our guard, if such a thing were possible, 
than at the beginning. What most interested me 
were the phenomena and illusions which are begotten 
by the atmosphere here upon the veldt where this war 
is to be fought out. 

Thus, every now and then a great cloud of whitish 
dust would breed upon the surface of the plain, and 
send a streaming tail of what looked like vapour turn- 
ing in a funnel-formed cloud toward the sky, or reach- 
ing far away in the wind. These sudden apparitions 
attracted close scrutiny, but in every instance they 
proved to be clouds of dust raised by moving flocks of 
sheep. 

Again the form of a swift riding horseman would 
appear afar, and seem to dart along the veldt. It was 
sure to be in truth an ostrich stalking with stately 



BATTLE CONDITIONS ON THE VELDT 119 

slowness. And the reverse of this was equally true, 
for a man in black clothing mounted on a grey horse 
had all the appearance of a supernatural bird. The 
rider's body cut the horse's form across, leaving two 
whitish ends visible, and when the horse galloped 
these parts of the animal rose and fell like wings. 

The surface of the veldt looked level, yet it was so 
far from that as to cause a body of our troops at one 
time, and at another time a railway train, to disappear 
suddenly, though the surface seemed flat all around 
them. They vanished at a few miles' distance, and 
though we imagined ourselves able to look down upon 
the whole plain, their further progress entirely was 
hidden from our view. 

Night began to fall, and we returned to the town. 
The trains presently came back with the men. From 
the first one was lifted the body of Lieut.-Colonel 
Keith Falconer, and then the dying form of Captain 
Wood. Four more wounded men — two privates and 
two officers — were in the throng, and a hush fell upon 
the post. Thus we had our first taste of war on this 
side of the enemy's country, our first sight of the 
shedding of heroic blood. Here, as elsewhere, we 
found that the Boers were indulging in illicit, savage 
warfare, singling out officers in order to cripple us. 

''They will not play the game fairly," said a soldier, 
when the news came in that three officers and only 
two privates were shot. 



I20 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

In the camp during the next day much that was 
interesting was said about the means which must be 
taken to give our officers a reasonable measure of pro- 
tection. Look at any reproduction of a photograph 
of British officers in khaki uniform which has been 
published in the London weeklies, and you will see 
that their buttons, and golden insignia of rank, gleam 
like diamonds against their uniforms. As you see 
them in the pictures, the Boers see them in the blazing 
sunshine on the veldt. 

" Tommy " has but few such points of metal, and 
these he is forbidden to polish. He must keep them 
dim. He must paint the sheath of his bayonet brown, 
and he may not even polish his boots. His rifle is 
his protection, just as the absence of a rifle marks an 
officer before the enemy. 

It came under discussion to have all officers who 
march with their men provided with light carbines. 
In that case the swords, whose silver handles now 
gleam like electric lights on the field of battle, would 
be discarded, and so would the coloured collar bands 
and shoulder ornaments, which make such shining 
marks. Matters of this sort the Boer does not have 
to consider. He fights behind rocks, and except in 
the case of his blue-clad artillery he fights in his civi- 
lian dress. 

The engagement near Belmont on November loth 
was but a trifling skirmish, and will only figure in 



BATTLE CONDITIONS ON THE VELDT 121 

history as the first collision of opposing troops on this 
side of the Dutch Republics. The purpose of the 
patrol was to discover the whereabouts and strength 
of the enemy in the region where they long ago blew 
up the railway. This was accomplished with blood- 
shed, only because the Boers disclosed their retreat by 
attacking our force. 



CHAPTER XII 

DUST AND KHAKI 

It sounds gruesome to liken the sending out of an 
army to the return of " dust to dust," and yet if the 
reader could see an army, or any number of soldiers, 
in khaki out on the veldt, he would at once think of 
the simile. 

South Africa looks as if it were the dustbin of 
creation. Its ground is loose dust. Its air is flying 
dust. Its vegetation, animals, and insects nearly all 
take differing shades of dust colour. 

On November 14th in the train from De Aar to 
Orange River I passed five miles of transports 
bringing up forage, food, and ammunition for Lord 
Methuen' s advance column of ten thousand men — 
which it was hoped would sweep its way to the relief 
of Kimberley Hke a witch's broom. 

All these waggons, mules, and negroes raised one 

long, high, dense cloud of reddish-brown dust, through 

which we saw the canvas that covered the carts, the 

black faces of the natives, and such of the horses as were 

white or black. The waggons, which are all painted 
122 



DUST AND KHAKI 123 

dust-colour, were lost to sight, and the half battalion 
of troops guarding the host we could not distinguish 
at all until we were almost beside them. 

Like all the troops we have in the field, they be- 
gan in uniforms of dirt-colour, and are constantly get- 
ting dirtier and dirtier. This does not sound like a 
proud or a pretty thing to say of her Majesty's valor- 
ous soldiers, but it is true ; it is so ordered, and it is 
good. 

We were all getting dirtier and dirtier — inside and 
out. We breathed dust, drank dust, and ate dust. 
Very often we are out of sorts, because our internal 
arrangements suffer, and rebel against this new order 
of things ; but the dust persists, our systems bow to 
it, and we go ahead fitter than before. 

Some of the natives, I believe, live on certain kinds 
of dirt, and have no bother about cooking and killing, 
and mowing and reaping. Perhaps if this war lasts 
long enough we shall simplify our affairs in the same 
way, for we are making great strides in that direction. 

I sat in my dusty tent with my boots buried in dust, 
writing with a solution of dust by means of a dusty 
brown pen, and every line was dusted and dried as 
soon as written — as our grandfathers dried their manu- 
script with sand. 

A dust-coloured cat strayed out on the veldt, and 
was watching a hole in the dust in order to catch a 
dust-coloured mouse. The air outside was as full of 



124 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

dust as your air in London is of smoke. The heat 
was intense, and all our throats were dry and caked 
with dust ; yet, to relieve our thirst, we must drink 
Orange River water — which is so full of mud that when 
a servant pours it in the basin, we think he must have 
washed his own hands in it first, without our having 
seen him do so. 

This bit of descriptive comment on the field of war 
could be carried on indefinitely, to point the moral of 
the moment — which is the wonderful aptness and value 
of khaki for military uniforms in South Africa. 

When we saw a little of it faring towards the Queen 
at St. Paul's on Diamond Jubilee Day we thought it 
very tidy and refreshing, mixed in with all the red and 
gold. It seems to have been only the Commander-in- 
chief of the American army who realised its practical 
value, for he went home and dressed his soldiers in it, 
ready for the war with Spain. But when one sees the 
British Army here, in this dust-coloured canvas, one 
quickly realises that it ranks high among the advan- 
tages we possess over the Boers. 

At distances where red or blue or black would be 
striking, khaki is not seen at all. It blends our men 
with the landscape so completely that in bright day- 
light, at short distances from the enemy, our forces 
almost gain the advantage of an army manoeuvring at 
night. 

We encouraged the men to allow their buttons to 



DUST AND KHAKI 125 

dull. We ordered them to paint their bayonet sheaths 
dust colour. Their kit-bags and water-bottles and all 
their belongings were khaki-coloured or matching it. 
Our big guns were painted like the ruddy earth, and 
our Maxims were wrapped in canvas great-coats of the 
universal hue. Our gun-carriages, limbers, great mule 
waggons, and small carts were all the same colour, and 
the water-tanks we dragged after the troops were indis- 
tinguishable from our other belongings. 

We were within two or three days of beginning our 
start, and the regiments who were to swell our force 
were being rushed to us from England and the Cape. 
What will they find their brothers in arms doing— 
these stalwart veterans who look so smart and dandi- 
fied when we see them in Chelsea, or the barracks 
near Buckingham Palace ? They will find them cloth- 
ing themselves with dust and mud — nothing more or 
less. 

Men might be seen dissolving mud in their pails, 
and dipping brushes in it to paint their white straps 
mud-colour. Every pouch and strap and cloth-covered 
water-bottle that would show white or dark underwent 
this treatment. And the drummers did the same with 
their drums — painting the white tightening cords with 
mud, muddying over the golden lions and unicorns 
and the gaudy regimental mottoes, so that everything 
should look like the veldt — so that we should be as 
dusty as our surroundings. 



126 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

When the heroines of the Arabian Nights' tales 
watched from their palace roofs to see the clouds of 
dust that announced the coming of their husbands and 
lovers, they knew that out of those clouds would 
emerge figures in gaudy silks, or lustrous gold and 
silver. But here on the veldt, if the hapless heroines 
in Kimberley and Mafeking were watching for us who 
were in Lord Methuen's flying force, it would be dif- 
ferent. They would see the dust separate from the 
moving body beneath it, but what that body was their 
best glasses could not have told them until it was 
within a mile or two. 

It might be no more than a troop of dust-coloured 
sheep moving in enormous bands upon the scorched 
veldt ; it might be only a line of dust-hued farm wag- 
gons, or, if they were not mistaken, and looked at just 
the right time, lo ! a dust-coated general and his staff, 
leading a myriad armed men, clothed and stained to 
match the colour of the ground. 

While Tommy was thus wholly dull and dusty in 
tone, his officers differed from him, wearing shiny but- 
tons, stars, crowns, and sword-hilts, and pipe-clayed 
belts and straps. In this difference has lain the danger 
of all in battle in this campaign, and from it has come 
the death of far too many. All alike recognise this, 
yet how differently they discuss the proposal that offi- 
cers should dress like the men. 

The Tommies were all in favour of the change, 



DUST AND KHAKI 127 

though it would greatly increase their own danger 
and losses. They were enthusiastic for having the 
officers doff swords, carry light carbines, and do away 
with their ornaments. They discussed the mortality 
above the ranks with bated breath, as a thing alto- 
gether awful ; and after one skirmish, where an officer 
was killed and two were wounded, I did not hear a 
Tommy speak of the two privates who died at the 
same time. Among officers the subject was differently 
treated. Some discussed the prospect of disguising 
themselves as if it were a thing to be considered only 
for the sake of deceiving an unfair foe, and gaining a 
point that way. Others indignantly spurned the idea 
as undignified and unworthy. 

As brave a man as any is Major Rimington, head of 
the Imperial Corps of Guides. 

" You may be sure," he said, " that the Boers will 
never know which are the officers and which the men 
in my troop. They'll all seem as like as so many 
peas." 

He might better have said " as so many walnuts,'* 
for these guides — scouts in reality — were more like 
the veldt than are the red ant-hills which dot it all 
over. They were the most picturesque body in Lord 
Methuen's advance column — two hundred of them — 
all rough-riders and all beautifully mounted. Each 
man was obliged to speak Boer or Kaffir, and many 
speak both. Everyone must be thoroughly well ac- 



128 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

quainted with some part of the country around and 
before us. All carried carbines and pistols, and round 
each man's dust-brown slouch hat was bound a strip 
of striped fur, like the raccoon skin of the early Ameri- 
can trappers and later Texan rangers. 

These men had been scouring the country literally 
for hundreds of square miles day and night while on 
duty at De Aar. Their pay is 5^^. a day. The people 
of the region called them the ** night cats," and their 
leader called them his " catch-em-alive-os." Two were 
Americans fresh from the Klondike, and their troop 
doctor was an American named Lindley, well known 
all over South Africa. The rest were all Afrikanders 
of English descent. Many had left the Transvaal and 
the Free State to side with the British. They liked 
their hard life, but prayed to be included in the fight- 
ing. 

In their troop the officers were as dusty as the men, 
and therefore they best of all typified the dusty army 
that was to blend itself with the dusty veldt, except 
when its rifles and guns vomited the flames of battle. 



CHAPTER XIII 

BATTLE OF BELMONT 

It was on the southern and western sides of the 
Orange Free State that offensive warfare was begun 
by the British. 

Like a tiger stalking its prey by night, in almost 
absolute silence, Lord Methuen's splendid flying col- 
umn of nearly ten thousand men started from Belmont 
Farm at half-past three on the morning of the 23rd 
of November. The moonlight fell softened through 
fleecy clouds, and the battalions, marching in a long, 
narrow queue, hugged the nearer hills so as to be hid- 
den in their shadow. 

The army knew that the Boers held the greater 
range, which ran north and south to form the easterly 
wall of the four which enclose a noble but desolate 
valley. 

Like a colossal centipede with twenty thousand legs, 

the column moved along the shadow of the more 

friendly hills, crawling a few score yards, then halting, 

then crawling a little farther. At each halt all the 

officers and men sank upon one knee. The orders to 
9 129 



I30 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

march, to halt, to kneel, and to rise were given by 
movements of the hands of the commanders, no word 
being spoken. 

Here and there a few men whispered now and then, 
but the light breeze which sifted through the wild 
sage of the veldt was louder than these hushed voices. 
Once, when we were leaving the hill shadows and 
crossing the corner of the valley to crouch for the 
deadly spring upon our foe, we came to a rocky patch, 
and our guns and ammunition waggons jolted and 
creaked among the obstacles, making our only noise, 
yet one which we felt the Boers must hear. The faint 
flush in the sky at the end of the Boer position told 
us that very soon they would also see us. 

And now a golden rim was pushed above the farthest 
kopje ; the wind-rumpled clouds that reached half 
across the plain took on the hue of blood — the look of 
curdled blood. The strange little birds called " dik- 
kopfs," or thickheads, so abundant here, began their 
work of shooting up from the veldt twenty feet, and 
crying "Hui!" and dropping back again upon the 
ground. " Hui ! hui ! " sounded ever so sadly all over 
the parched desert, so soon to quaff the blood of hun- 
dreds. 

At that moment we saw our valiant British moving 
in thin lines nearly two miles long. They looked like 
sportsmen stalking game, as each held his rifle ready 
in both hands, and all crouched as they strode along 



BATTLE OF BELMONT 131 

with frequent haltings. At that moment too there 
ran along the crest of the great southern kopje quick, 
vivid jets of fire, like jewels flashing in a coronet on 
the hills' brow. It was the flame of a volley from the 
Boers fired at the nearest British ! 

This was the beginning of a fearful fight, one of the 
severest that even English soldiers have ever faced. 
It fell to the lot of the Grenadier Guards to storm 
that particular hill. They saw the rim of fire beads 
flash along the crest, and die away, and race along the 
crest again, as tiny gas jets blow out and re-ignite in 
heavy wind. But it was what they felt^a deadly hail 
of bullets — that tried them, without finding them 
wanting. For protection and retort they could only 
shoot almost straight above their heads, without ever 
seeing their foe hidden behind the topmost boulders. 

They were advancing in too close formation, giving 
the bullets but little chance to miss the aggregate 
mass. Mown down as grass before a scythe, still they 
climbed up and onward, never dreaming of another 
course. Some men of the Northamptonshire Regi- 
ment dashed up after them, and, all together, they 
drove the Boers from that fastness, and saw them 
leaping down the further side of the hill, and across a 
little valley to the heights beyond. 

The Grenadiers, out of but a part of the battalion, 
lost something like 120 men in a few minutes. But 
almost as severe work was done by their comrades in 



132 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

arms, by the Scots Guards, the Northamptonshires, 
the Northumberland Fusiliers, and the King's Own 
Yorkshire Light Infantry, in different parts of the 
field. The Northumberlands tackled a Boer position 
next in strength to that stormed by the Grenadiers, 
and also lost heavily. 

The battle opened at about 4.20 a.m., and it was pre- 
cisely three hours later that a volley of British cheers 
proclaimed the capture of the last of the strongly-for- 
tified hills. The artillery and naval guns, which had 
not been brought into action until five o'clock, silenced 
the last of two Boer batteries at the moment of this 
cheering. 

After that the Boers ran down from the hills like 
flowing water, and took up new positions on some 
lower land behind. Fierce attacks, notably by the 
Yorkshires, Northumberlands, and Northamptons, 
quickly made the new positions untenable, and the 
rest of that day's drama revealed the rapid flight of 
the Boers over the open veldt, and the ineffectual pur- 
suit of them by the 9th Lancers. 

During this engagement the Boers fought their own 
style of battle obstinately and with courage. But — 
and it seems there must always be a " but " when one 
endeavours to give credit generously to this foe — they 
marred the day most shockingly. 

In two places they displayed flags of truce in order 
to bring the British out of cover, and then shoot them 



BATTLE OF BELMONT 133 

down. In one case, where the famous correspondent, 
E. F. Knight, was wounded, every one of the offenders 
was killed. In the other the man who tied his hand- 
kerchief to his rifle was subsequently taken prisoner. 
Besides this treachery, twelve of our men were shot 
with dum-dum bullets. 

I went upon the field with the King's Own York- 
shire Light Infantry, and a description of the manner 
in which they went into action will serve as illustrating 
the course pursued by all the forces except the Naval 
Brigade. The privates were, as already described, 
with dulled buttons, muddied straps and belts and 
pouches, and with the handles and scabbards of their 
bayonets painted khaki colour. 

On this eventful morning, for the first time in their 
lives, perhaps for the first time in British history, the 
officers threw aside their swords and put on the accou- 
trements of privates, even to their rifles. Thus I saw 
Colonel Barter, of the Yorkshires, stride off with his 
battalion, and thus he led them into the hell's rain of 
lead, obeying the letter of the new regulation by an 
attempt at disguise, which took no note of his towering 
and athletic figure, or his natural pose and carriage of 
command. Thus dressed I also saw the gallant com- 
mander of the Grenadier Guards lying in the broiling 
sun, propped against a rock, wounded — and telling the 
ambulance men to look after his gashed and blood- 
stained men who lay around him among the rocks. 



134 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

Let it be remembered in all accounts of battles in this 
war that, if Tommy has the hottest sort of work, he 
does it side by side with his officers. Such is the tra- 
ditional Anglo-Saxon way. 



CHAPTER XIV 

BOERS IN WAR 

After the Belmont battle I walked over the entire 
field, and between what I saw, and what was told me 
by our officers and men who had taken part in the as- 
sault, I learned more about the Boers as fighting men 
than I had been able to gather all over the Cape Colony 
in the preceding four weeks. 

A kopje in this country is practically a pile of boul- 
ders — a stone heap. It may be either a hill or a small 
mountain — fifty feet or one thousand five hundred 
feet in height, though in the battlefields where we 
had thus far fought the kopjes had not been above 
five hundred, or less than one hundred and fifty 
feet. 

All were heaps of loose boulders, and the practice of 
the enemy was to lift and carry the smaller rocks about, 
so as to build breastworks of them. 

Behind these, always built around the tops of the 
hills, the Boers hide and shoot. 

Let me describe the top of one small hill in the Bel- 

135 



136 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

mont engagement, the one in storming which the 
brave Grenadiers suffered part of their fearfully heavy 
loss. All around the edge of its crest were circular or 
semi-circular breastworks of rocks. They were so 
many forts — one for each fighting man. Placed high 
in air, and overlooking a great valley, they were very 
like the lofty eyries of birds of prey. To look into 
them, with their rude bedding, scattered food, and 
general debris, was as if one viewed the nests of so 
many hawks. 

On this kopje the Boer commander had compelled 
the poorer men of his commando to live for weeks. 
I took it that these were men of the servant and the 
labourer class. Their dead, whose untidy and neglected 
bodies I saw seated as the British bullets and bayonets 
found them, confirmed this theory, for they were 
poorly clad, unshaven, unclean, and hungry-looking. 
They were of that class of Boer whom James Bryce 
describes as having started at a seventeenth-century 
standard, and deteriorated for three hundred years. I 
knew when I saw such men among the dead, the 
wounded, and the prisoners, how it could be that white 
men could misuse the white flag, and mock the sacred 
purpose of the Geneva Cross. 

In nearly every eyrie where men had been compelled 
to stay and live there was a tea-kettle, an extra coat for 
night covering, a sack in which food and clothes had 
been brought, and which next had served as a pallet ; 



BOERS IN WAR 137 

some mealies, unleavened biscuits or bread-cakes, junks 
of biltong or jerked meat, and a kitchen knife. 

The food, the dirt, and the extraordinary profusion 
of cartridges and cartridge-wrappings were all mixed 
together, but the dirt and the disorder were not so 
o'ffensive as the grimy and revolting condition of the 
dead. 

A few commanding breastworks had been built as 
for a citadel on the crest of the kopje above the ring 
of eyries. 

In one of these I found a young Boer dead, with a 
bullet hole in his forehead. He was of a superior type, 
intelligent of face, neatly dressed, and had been 
shooting with gloves on his hands. Had he lived to 
escape he would have been one of the very great many 
Boers who were seen flying down the farther side of 
the range of kopjes, and leaping upon their horses or 
into their Cape carts and " spiders." They had done 
what damage they could to us, and as soon as 
their own lives were endangered, they commanded 
their subordinates to remain, and sought their own 
safety. 

These are Boer principles — in keeping with the 
etiquette and conventions of a people who know 
neither the customs nor courtesies of war. It is not 
by guesswork that I thus describe their methods. It 
is. what our prisoners have told me. 

It would take long to exhaust the list of peculiarities. 



138 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

eccentricities, anomalies, and novelties of this war, 
waged against us by an undisciplined force of rebels, who 
are soldiers by instinct, slayers by training, and farmers 
or cattle-raisers for livelihood. But more astonishing 
is the fact that some of the better-class Boers have 
come to battle in their carriages, like gentlemen driving 
to the Derby at home, and, having done their best, 
have retired in the same way, leaving their vassals to 
cover their retreat. 

More numerous than those who come in carriages to 
battle are those who send their best horses ahead, and 
ride to the front on inferior animals. They " knee- 
halter " their best horses, turn out upon the veldt the 
poorer ones they have ridden, and — when retreat is 
ordered — run down the kopjes and mount their fast 
steeds in order to be able to elude a cavalry chase, 
which had thus far been impossible because the horses 
of our few mounted men had either had too much 
work earlier in the day, or were overwhelmed by fire 
from unexpected quarters. 

I heard that the only uniforms in the Boer ranks 
were those of the Transvaal Artillery, but if this was 
true, I had not yet seen them. All whom I had seen 
were clad like the farmers and villagers we met with 
along our line of march. They wore short coats, 
trousers of patterns that are often so loud that they 
almost scream, and narrow-brimmed soft hats of light- 
brown felt. 



BOERS IN WAR 139 

The prisoners whom we captured seemed a sullen, 
unprepossessing lot, asking no favours, and taking 
kindnesses very callously. Most of them pretended 
to understand no English, though I am assured that 
there are no Free State Boers who do not habitually 
speak English with the English, and Dutch among 
themselves. 

With the far greater number of men who delivered 
themselves to us, or deliberately put themselves in the 
way of capture, the case was different. 

They were of English or partly British blood, held 
their heads up, displayed bright eyes and frank faces, 
and said bluntly that they had not believed in the war, 
or taken part in it except under compulsion. They 
told us that no notice was given them ; that the com- 
manders or field cornets rode up to their houses, and 
ordered them to fall in and follow at once. The 
legalised penalty for refusal was death. To compare 
these men with the miscreant we captured after he 
had ensnared some of our men with a false flag of 
truce would be like comparing cultivation with bar- 
barism — a Londoner with a cave-dweller. This scoun- 
drel wore stiff, bristling hair all round a face whose 
features were those of a primitive man. 

In their kopjes at Belmont the ground was littered 
with cartridges, every one of which bore the mark of 
the leading London makers. This was true of every- 
thing else that was captured, or left behind by these 



I40 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

*' Orange Free Staters " ; everything of theirs bore 
English marks. It was not until we met with a 
Transvaal commando at the battle of Graspan (other- 
wise called Enslin and Royslaagte) that we saw any 
exception to this rule. 



CHAPTER XV 

BATTLE OF GRASPAN 

The battle of Belmont, with which Lord Methuen 
opened the ball on his side of the Republics, was 
almost wholly an infantry fight, but that at Graspan 
was rather more an artillery duel ; in fact, the artillery 
came into greater play and prominence as the battles 
succeeded one another. 

Although the British infantry had borne brave part 
and suffered considerable losses, the last two victories 
had been greatly accelerated by cannon, and the next 
one was to see our batteries more conspicuous still. 
The nature of the Boer defences, and the Boer dread 
of artillery, have brought this about. 

The battle of Graspan was called " Enslin " officially 
by the army, and Royslaagte by the Boers, but the 
word " Graspan " was painted on the railway station 
signboard beside the position occupied by our left, and 
so strongly had the name taken root that no other 
need be used in treating of that fight. 

The Boers fortified themselves on a series of low 

steep hills, broken at the left by a long, grassy ridge, 

141 



142 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

which linked a smaller stony kopje to the larger ones. 
On this smaller kopje a Transvaal commando fought 
with German ammunition — the first Transvaalers and 
the first foreign ammunition used against us. Before 
the battle opened some of us saw Boers as thick as ants 
on a grassy ridge, moving over to the larger kopjes. 

It was at about six o'clock in the morning of the 
26th that fire was opened on a party of Rimington's 
scouts who were in advance of us. Then our troops 
marched into position facing the larger kopjes, and 
half an hour later our batteries opened fire on the 
rocks which hid the enemy. The naval battery in the 
centre, at five thousand yards distance, joined with 
the shorter-range artillery in bursting shrapnel with 
unvarying accuracy over the enemy. The Boers as 
repeatedly shot beyond and behind our men. They 
seemed to have guns everywhere, stationed singly all 
over the hills. 

Soon after seven o'clock the excellent marksman- 
ship of a gunner behind the grassy ridge attracted the 
attention, and perhaps stirred the pride, of our gun- 
ners, and the naval battery undertook to silence him. 
Then began a very dramatic and long-sustained com- 
bat which was a striking feature of the battle. The 
Boer gun was never seen, and the man who served it 
never once saw us. His piece was hidden beyond the 
ridge on the further slope, and a comrade gave him 
his range and direction. 



BATTLE OF GRASPAN 143 

For a long time this gunner devoted his attention 
to one of our field batteries. Next he attacked the 
black mass made by their horses and limbers. Later 
he paid his respects to the naval gun and its crew. 
He never achieved perfect excellence, for he did no 
damage to any British gun, he killed but two horses 
in the field, and he wounded but five of our men alto- 
gether. And yet he got his range so quickly and well, 
and he was so persistent and so wholly invisible, that 
our men set their teeth in grim determination to 
destroy him. They had for a target nothing but the 
thin smoke which rose over his gun, but into that little 
floating cloud they planted shot and shell, until at the 
end of the day they had expended two hundred and 
ten rounds, if I remember the extraordinary figure 
correctly. All the other Boer guns were silenced 
before this one was, and at twenty minutes to ten 
this was disabled, and every gun of the enemy was 
speechless. 

Presently, at about half-past seven, our men began 
creeping closer and closer to the foe hidden among the 
stones above our heads. At 7.45 the Boer riflemen 
discharged a fiendish series of sharp volleys at us, 
assisted by their batteries. Our field batteries took 
note of the position of these guns, and bent a cross- 
fire upon them, dropping two, three, and even four 
shells at a time upon the Boer artillery. It was after 
eight o'clock when our infantry made another of those 



144 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

gallant rushes into a rain of lead which this war has 
called for with a frequency, and with a quality of dan- 
ger, that I fancy no previous conflict has so often 
evoked. 

The bulk of the enemy held a tall, rocky kopje, and 
our plan was to rush it, as we had rushed several such 
strongholds at Belmont. The troops of the Ninth 
Brigade led the way, and the Naval Brigade were in 
the very front. The Guards Brigade, lustrous with 
honour after the manner in which they had borne the 
brunt of the last fight, were now in the rear, drawn up 
in wide formation on the level veldt, and advancing 
slowly to support the attacking force. 

The naval men marched boldly to the foot of the 
kopje, meeting, but not daunted by, the fearful fire. 

They reached the rocks and began the ascent, 
huddled together, as if in utter ignorance of the dire 
necessity, in such warfare, for giving such a hail of 
shot all possible room to spend itself in space, and the 
least possible chance to lodge in human bodies. It is 
said that the shape of the kopje made this in some 
degree necessary, but they appeared to despise all 
danger. 

They spent but very little time in taking breath, or 
in seeking shelter among the rocks ; and pushed 
straight up the acclivity, now walking, now spurting 
up in short dashes. 

It was horrible to see what damage befell them. 



BATTLE OF GRASPAN 145 

An officer of the King's Own Yorkshire Light Infantry 
declared that in the heat of the rush he could only 
think of his sorr(3w for these men — his sorrow, and his 
amazement at their valour. And Major Lindley, sur- 
geon to Rimington's Guides, said he was riveted to 
the spot by the sight of such magnificent, reckless 
courage, though the bullets were falling thickly around 
him also. 

One man in every two was struck down in the 
furious onset of that little brigade of straw-hatted 
shipmates, and precisely one half the force fell on the 
kopje, dead or wounded. 

The Yorkshires, moving five paces apart, dashed up 
to support the marines, the men of the Northampton- 
shire Regiment followed, and all stormed the position 
together. 

Perhaps another battalion was in the rear, but these 
were the men who were in first at the death. They 
made it far too hot for the astonished Boers, who 
turned and fled down the other side of the hill, as the 
first of the British reached its top. 

From the veldt the Boers were seen fleeing along the 
low ridge in great numbers, while our men, who had 
occupied their position, saw greater numbers dashing 
on horseback into the open country to the northward. 

A battery was sent for to shell them ; it seemed as 
if with this help the majority of the runaways might 
be captured, but the horses were spent, and in an 



10 



146 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

hour's time no battery had come. Our mounted in- 
fantry started to pursue the fugitives by passing be- 
tween two middle kopjes, from and at which not a shot 
had been fired, and without the slightest warning two 
volleys, as concerted as if fired by Europeans, checked 
them with a sheet of missiles. It was estimated that 
fifteen hundred Boers had been in hiding there. They, 
too, melted away before word of their presence could 
be sent to our leaders. 

Thus the battle ended. The enemy had been shelled 
away from some strongholds. The gallantry of our 
foot forces had accelerated their flight from others, 
and destroyed a great number of them, but the day 
belonged to the men who handled our great guns. 

Our losses were 155 killed, 165 wounded, and the 
Boers suffered very nearly as heavily. As they sink 
their dead in rivers, bury them in the sand, and ride 
off with them over their saddle-bows, it is never easy 
to estimate their casualties. 



CHAPTER XVI 

BATTLE OF MODDER RIVER 

We had fought two battles in five days, and then, 
after a short march, had come upon a large pond, and 
had halted and camped beside it. 

What a priceless possession water was, or the taste 
of it, or even the sight of it, to ten thousand march- 
ing men on this parched veldt ! We had started from 
water at Orange River, marched to water at Fincham's 
Farm, then on again to the next water at Belmont, 
and fought there. Thence we had marched to Gras- 
pan and fought, treasuring a little water more than we 
treasured human lives, and so on until we filled our 
carts and bottles at this pond by Honey Nest Kloof. 

To the north of us, in purple bulk, rose the hills 
that lie a few miles beyond the Modder River. They 
interested us because many said that in or beyond 
them we must meet the Boers for the last time before 
entering Kimberley, a dozen miles farther on. But 
we had water a-plenty — to drink, to wash in, even for 
bathing on the part of those who did not mind doing 
so in a pond where the mules were watered, and the 
mud was some feet deep. 



148 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

We could not see the Modder, but we knew that it 
somewhere pierced the wide, nearly level field of sage 
tufts and sparse young grass before us. As the after- 
noon wore on we heard that just out of sight there was 
a village in our path where three hundred Boers were 
entrenched. One story was that a part of their force 
had shot at another part for trying to desert. An- 
other rumour ran that, instead of this, all had shot at 
Rimington's " night cat " guides, who had sent in to 
us for help which we had not supplied. 

But we were camped beside abundant water, we had 
fought two stiff battles in five days, and we were rest- 
ing. Take my own case to show how others fared : I 
had borrowed a waterproof covering from an ammuni- 
tion cart, and had made a shelter of it over four up- 
rights — two guns and two sticks. I had filled my 
water-bottle, and also a two-quart canvas bag which 
leaked, and I was lying on a blanket, writing a descrip- 
tion of Belmont fight, and exulting in the sound of the 
waste of my water as it dripped from the bag. Every 
half-hour I quaffed water, or treated the colonel, or the 
Times correspondent, to a drink. This was out of 
pure camaraderie, for they had plenty also. When it 
was too dark to write I washed my other flannel shirt 
and my other socks, and dabbled in the water. All of 
us in the Yorkshire Light Infantry did the same, as if 
we were ducks. 

In the morning of the next day, Tuesday, Novem- 



BATTLE OF MODDER RIVER 149 

ber 28th, we took marching form at the leisurely hour 
of half-past four, and even then halted often. Briga- 
dier-General Pole-Carew had just arrived, and rode 
about the field, being introduced to the commanders 
of the battalions of the 9th Brigade — the Yorkshire 
Light Infantry, 5th Northumberlands, Loyal Lanca- 
shires, the Northamptonshires, the Mounted Infantry, 
9th Lancers, the Royal Artillerymen, and the rest. 
In the other brigade the two Coldstreams, the Scots 
Guards, the Grenadiers, and the freshly-arrived Argyll 
and Sutherland Regiment were forming the right of 
the advance. 

We marched four miles or more, and were able to 
see a long, thin fringe of trees which we were certain 
marked the hidden course of the Modder, flowing in a 
stream twenty or thirty yards wide at the bottom of 
the deep channel it had cut in the level prairie — a huge 
canal, yet one that was as invisible until you cime to 
its edge as were the Boers who lined the bank, down 
on their knees, Mausers in hand, like a three-mile jaw 
full of sunken teeth. 

Three miles of Boers were there, and behind them 
in the hills and on the farther shore they had taken 
up a six-mile artillery line. Straight towards them 
we marched on. Hares scampered from before us, 
a flock of bustards rose clumsily at our approach, 
the little ''thickheads'* shot up, cried '' Hui ! " and 
fell into the sage, but otherwise all was calm and 



ISO TOWARDS PRETORIA 

peaceful — a glorious, brilliant summer morning on the 
veldt. 

Far over on the right a body of perhaps five hun- 
dred horsemen rode in full view, bunched together; 
halted, and then rode on again, Hke theatrical cavalry 
moving across a stage. They were Boers showing 
themselves to the British openly for the first time in 
our experience with Lord Methuen's column. They 
were impudent. They rode rapidly to the left, and 
our mounted infantry gave them chase. A concealed 
gun beside a little mud-house opened fire on the 
mounted men, our i8th Battery retorted, and thus 
began this battle, so memorable in many ways, so 
unique in several aspects, so certain to have a dis- 
tinct place of its own in British history. 

This was at about seven o'clock in the morning. 
The Boers who had shown themselves were shelled 
out of a little laager on the extreme right, and chased 
ineffectually by our mounted infantry. Boer guns 
belched flame and thin blue smoke from several posi- 
tions across the hidden river, our 1 8th and 75th Field 
Batteries replied with spirit, and the Lancers rode far 
to the right, to be within hail if the vanishing mounted 
infantry needed fleet help. The batteries all along 
our four or five mile line came into action as a larger 
number of Boer guns disclosed their positions, and our 
infantry, long halted, began a slow advance, feeling its 
way. The Guards Brigade went straight ahead toward 



BATTLE OF MODDER RIVER 151 

the river, forming the right wing. The 9th Brigade 
moved diagonally across to the left toward the part of 
the river beyond the broken railway bridge, where they 
found a field battery, and the naval guns covering them 
with hot fire. 

Where the Guards advanced the plain inclined down- 
ward from the river like a theatre stage. On the other 
side of the railway — to the left — there was a well-de- 
fined ridge between our soldiers and the river, and this 
concealed their approach. On the right the hidden 
Boers in their trenches on our side of the Modder could 
see the body of a man at any point before them for 
three miles. On the left those who were on the fur- 
ther shore could only see our forces after they reached 
the ridge which ran across. 

It was nearly ten o'clock when the Boers on the right 
opened upon our advancing Guards a hot continuous 
rifle fire, unprecedented in severity and duration, which 
ceased for only two brief intervals between ten o'clock 
in the morning and twenty minutes past six o'clock in 
the evening, when the sun sank. Like a ripping of 
the air, like a tearing of some part of nature, that hell's 
vomit began, and was immediately answered by the 
Guards. 

Our soldiers started forward with 150 to 160 rounds, 
and many bags and boxes of cartridges were sent creep- 
ingly to them during the afternoon. The Boers had 
more ammunition than we. When I walked through 



152 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

their trenches at next daybreak it seemed as though 
they had been standing toe deep in their shells ; that 
they had had cartridges to sleep upon, to eat, to bury 
their dead beneath, if they had cared to use them in 
such ways. 

At first soldiers and correspondents called to each 
other that they had never heard such a fury of firing. 
An hour or two later somebody asked what it sounded 
like, and I said : " crackers let off in a barrel." Two 
or three hours later it seemed more like an exaggerated 
sound of the perpetual frying of fat. 

Lord Methuen, in the course of the morning, led a 
movement of the Guards to flank the Boers. He 
realised the need of some bold and gallant, even grand, 
action to shorten this duel between a foe that was 
unseen, yet could see, and his worthier force, which 
could not do else than lie still or suffer useless dam- 
age. The general's purpose was valiantly attempted, 
but the fire was too hot and the river too deep, so that 
his plan had to be abandoned so far as the right of 
the field was concerned. 

Before and long after this I moved behind the Scots 
and Coldstreams, seeing the wounded limp away, or 
crawl back, or being carried in, always through a fire 
so thick and fearful that no man can imagine how any 
one passed under or through it. Many could not. I 
saw and heard of many who, being crippled, lay flat 
for hours, not daring to rise for succour. If one asked 



BATTLE OF MODDER RIVER 153 

a comrade for a drink of water, he saw the bottle, or 
the hand that was passing it, pierced by a dum-dum 
or a one-pounder Nordenfeldt shell. Or il he raised 
his head to writhe in his pain he felt his helmet shot 
away. 

From the rear ammunition-carriers and stretcher- 
bearers walked boldly forward, until, the moment 
they were within range, a sheet, a torrent of bullets 
and small shells raked the air, as jets of water spurt 
from a flower-sprinkler. But that image is too faint, 
for the jets were all whistling or shrieking, throwing 
up fountains of red sand, exploding in hundreds of 
detonations like echoes of the guns that spewed them. 
At this down upon their bellies dropped the stretcher- 
bearers and the cartridge-carriers, and there they lay 
for hours, never rising or attempting to rise without 
loosing this torrent anew. Once a poor Coldstream 
private with one foot shot away lay in this leaden rain 
crying for help. I gave him my water-bottle, and Mr. 
Knox, the Reuter correspondent, ran to some stretch- 
er-bearers to beg them to carry the man to the ambu- 
lance train. 

" We would be killed if we went to him," one said. 

" Come with me," said Knox ; " Fll lead if you will 
follow." Thus relief came to one poor sufferer. 

This was the state of affairs on the right, and thus it 
remained for more than eight hours ; but the extraor- 
dinary fact about it is that nothing was being effected 



154 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

by this awful and unparalleled fire. A few hundreds 
were hit on both sides, but our front was not ad- 
vanced — did not progress materially the whole day 
long. The little lot of Boers who had been so auda- 
cious earlier in the day returned in the afternoon, 
after the mounted infantry had given up trying to 
capture them. And now they flanked us and poured 
a tremendous volley or two into our ambulance and 
ammunition train, frightening the Kaffir drivers and 
their mules into a panic, and yet not profiting by their 
success, for they retired as suddenly as they had re- 
appeared. 

This firing on the ambulances with their loads of 
wounded was not an isolated incident. Earlier in the 
day I had three times seen the terrible new Maxim- 
Nordenfeldt one-pound quick-firer trained on our Red 
Cross men who were sent forward to be nearer the 
wounded and to gather them in. 

That awful new gun ! Mauser fire starts with a 
crack ! goes on with the buzz of a bee, and ends with 
a ping I in the earth or one's body. One gets used to 
it, familiar with it, a little inclined to be indifferent 
to it. But the new one-pound quick-firer carries a 
menace which compels respect. It goes off with a 
"putt — putt — putt — putt,'* like the ten-billion-times- 
exaggerated noise of water gurgling in a bottle. The 
force and violence and intensity of the noise make it 
seem that whatever is coming will perforate chilled 



BATTLE OF MODDER RIVER 155 

steel. And then come the bullets, like so many jets 
of steam released from the highest pressure, and sing- 
ing like little steam-whistles. 

It was on the right that nothing was being effected. 
We were more active and successful on the left. 

Lord Methuen had gone over to that side in the 
afternoon, and had found the Yorkshire Light In- 
fantry In the van, and at the slight ridge which in a 
measure commanded the Boers. Some of them were 
in a small house on our side of the river, and these 
had been routed by a rush of the Yorkshires. Captain 
Bond and his men were in advance, and these Lord 
Methuen took with him in an attempt to ford the 
stream. It was not within human possibility for this 
to be done at that point, so hot was the fire from be- 
hind walls and earthworks beyond, and so unfordable 
was the river there. It was in retiring under this 
blistering fire that the general was wounded — a flesh 
wound entailing considerable suffering, but happily 
no real danger. 

The brave example he set was followed by Colonel 
Barter, of the Yorkshires, who, with twenty men or 
more, rushed for a shallow stony spot in the river, and 
got across, while a battery and the rifle fire of the men 
behind him drove the Boers out of the angle of wall 
and the trenches that had covered the ford. Other 
men pressed after these, notably some of the Argyll 
and Sutherland Regiment, who behaved most gallantly. 



156 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

Colonel Barter and his force of four hundred at its 
largest, now advanced to the right towards the Boer 
stronghold, through gardens and over walls. But they 
were so confused with the enemy, whose position they 
had taken, that they received the fire of our own 
troops, and even a shell from one of our batteries. 
Therefore they rested where this fire halted them, on 
the enemy's side. 

Their success, and the unceasing and accurate fire 
of our guns all day long, quite exhausted the stamina 
of the Boers. They held to their trenches until dusk 
and then retired, sinking some of their dead in the 
river, it is said, carrying off what wounded they could, 
and spiriting away their guns in the almost magical 
manner in which they have performed these feats after 
each of their battles. 

They had twenty guns to our nineteen, and while 
none of ours were better than twelve-pounders, they 
had at least one very heavy piece. They massed 
eleven thousand men, and we had less than ten thou- 
sand. They fought in a position of which they had 
boasted as their best. 

About one hundred were slain, and we took nearly 
as many prisoners, while their wounded probably 
equalled ours in number. Taken at such a tremen- 
dous disadvantage, it was certain that we must suffer 
great damage. Our losses were 6y killed, 370 wound- 
ed, 18 missing. Of the killed, four were officers, and 



BATTLE OF MODDER RIVER 157 

there were 19 officers wounded. Our gains were 
greater. We beat their largest force on this side, and 
the three generals who led it ; we rested beyond their 
stongest position, twenty-four miles from Kimberley, 
hoping soon to be there. 



CHAPTER XVII 

ECHOES OF MODDER RIVER 

The more one saw of Modder River battle-field, and 
the more one considered the battle, the more its ter- 
rific character was revealed and realised. 

Some phases of the fight, and some of the tales we 
heard of the part the Boers played in it, make it cer- 
tain that there never was a battle like it. 

At first we were impressed by the sagacity shown 
by the Boer leaders in intrenching their men where 
they did, at the top and back of a vast, smooth, in- 
clined plane, every inch of which was visible to these 
hidden men. 

But by remaining long enough to go thoroughly 
over the field, we learned that an even stronger and in 
all ways better position could have been made for 
most of them just behind the one they chose, and on 
the island in the river. 

It must be understood that their horde lay intrenched 
on the edge of the river at a point where the Modder 
and the Reit join one another. 

The land between the two is called an island, and 

158 



ECHOES OF MODDER RIVER 159 

this land continues the upward slope of the veldt, so 
that it is higher and more commanding, and, better 
yet for Boer purposes, it is luxuriant with trees and 
bushes. 

Here, in fact, the Boers did put their sharp-shooters, 
and here they manipulated their deadly " putt-putt " 
gun, as our army has nicknamed the Vickers-Maxim 
quick-firer, which commanded such respect as to make 
every man who heard it bow his head or prostrate his 
body. 

Men so shrewd and instinctively soldierly as the 
Boers must have known that this more elevated posi- 
tion, with the river in front of it as a moat, was supe- 
rior to the one they selected. 

A story which many Boer prisoners have told us 
tends to explain why the lower ground was chosen — 
though it is a tale which can be credited only by those 
of us who are accustomed to the extraordinary phases 
and conditions of this strangest of modern wars. 

The story is that a large proportion of the Free State 
Boers were so averse to fighting in the first place, and 
so shaken by our incessant and accurate artillery fire, 
that they were only kept in the trenches at the point 
of revolvers held over them by their leaders, who 
swore to shoot any man who tried to desert. This 
was told us by many prisoners taken at different times 
and places. 

If it is true, it may well be that there was a serious 



i6o TOWARDS PRETORIA 

purpose in choosing the lower ground for the Boer 
position, because thus the river, where it is deepest 
and impossible to ford, was immediately at their backs. 

After I had seen no more of the field than their 
three-mile line of trenches, I could not understand 
how we had been able to dislodge them, or why they 
had at last left the field to us. Their position seemed 
superb — impregnable. But yesterday a search for the 
place from which the " putt-putt " gun was fired led 
me to the island overlooking the river and the trenches. 
Then I saw plainly why and how we had gained the 
victory. 

Beyond the British infantry lines, where our Guards* 
Brigade were so cruelly forced to lie for more than 
eight hours under a driving rain of lead from an enemy 
they could never see, we worked three Royal Artillery 
batteries. These were the i8th and 75th, which fired 
all day long, and the 62nd, which came twenty miles 
to our aid, and got into action at half-past four in the 
afternoon, with horses so fagged that the men had 
been obliged to walk the last few miles. 

These batteries played on the trenches and on the 
island, which two points are so close that both were 
damaged alike. The shells which scattered their 
shrapnel upon the men in the trenches carried their 
heavy metal cases over to the island. Much of the 
shrapnel was also carried there. The result, as seen 
afterwards, was a surface devastation almost baffling 



ECHOES OF MODDER RIVER i6i 

description. In the space of a mile in length and a 
quarter of a mile in width there was scarcely a square 
yard not torn up, perforated, riddled, ploughed, and 
raked. Shrapnel bullets, shell cases, fuses, and bits of 
metal lay all over the place. Incredible as it sounds, 
there were on that ground two rusty old tins — one a 
small " bully-beef " tin and the other a biscuit-tin, both 
riddled with shrapnel and shot. 

In that scene lies the explanation of the flight of 
the Boers. In that scene one finds some confirmation 
of the story that the Boers had to be kept to their 
work under threat of the revolver. 

A common reliance of the Boer was upon gin. 
Empty gin-bottles, bottles still containing gin, and 
one full bottle of that spirit, were to be seen stuck in 
the loose dirt of the trenches. In every trench was a 
surprising litter of shell cartridges of many sorts — 
Mausers, Martini-Henrys, and two or three sorts of 
expanding and explosive bullets. 

The island seems to have been where the sharp- 
shooters were placed — on the ground, behind trenches, 
and in the trees. We understood from the prisoners 
that these were always stationed in couples, and that 
the orders were that whenever one was killed or 
wounded his companion was to bury him, or carry him 
off the field. Continually we found the dead bodies 
of Boers in the river, buried in the sand with fingers or 

boots protruding, heaped in a trench, and elsewhere. 
II 



i62 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

When I searched the island I found profuse proofs 
of other burials beside these — of new dead not included 
in any estimate. Here were grave-shaped mounds of 
such fresh appearance and suggestive shape that I 
examined them. They were covered with short bush 
growths, and lo ! when we touched these they came 
out of the earth, and were seen to be tree-twigs, and 
branches cut from trees and stuck in the mounds. 

Some distance back in the island we found a large 
trench, of a size to hold twenty bodies. It gave indu- 
bitable proof of its contents. As we understand the 
tactics of our enemy, these graves are apt to be those 
of their humbler soldiers. We know that they carry 
off in carts, and across their saddles, the bodies of the 
more important dead. 

This was done at this battle. A woman, whose 
cottage was in the rear of a field north of the river, 
declared that all day long the wounded came to her 
house upon each other's heels to have their wounds 
dressed, and said that the dead in large numbers were 
carried upon planks placed upon the backs of ponies 
northward to the Boer lines. First in the mind of the 
Boer is the desire to hide his dead, and to lie about 
their number. It is from their own that they most 
desire to hide the truth. The prisoners we took all 
said that only eighteen had been killed, but the 
deserters said the loss of life was very great, and that 
in the river quite a hundred were sunk with weights. 



ECHOES OF MODDER RIVER 163 

We may learn some day that in killed alone the 
Boers lost at least three hundred. 

It is wonderful how the formation of the country 
aids, and perhaps inspires, the Boer methods of war- 
fare. You have heard how the burgher comes to 
battle with two horses, a poor one to carry him to the 
fight, and the best steed he has to be kept fresh until 
it is needed to carry him swiftly away. Usually we 
have seen the Boers run down the far sides of the 
kopjes they have been defending, to find horses knee- 
haltered on the veldt, and to mount them and ride 
away. 

At Belmont, when a thousand or more were in full 
flight, they all suddenly disappeared in a mysterious 
way. We found that all had' ridden into what they 
call a " sluit," which is broad and deep enough to hide 
a cavalry regiment. In this trough or ravine they 
made their way to the next place of rendezvous. On 
the island at Modder River such a ravine or trough 
exists. It is thirty feet wide and fifteen deep. We 
found its bottom covered with hay and other fodder, 
and we knew that in it, out of harm's way and yet 
close at hand, they had kept their horses in readiness 
for their retreat. 

After every battle the veldt has been dotted with 
Boer horses, in consequence of this custom of bringing 
a remount for each well-to-do man, and in consequence 
of the loss of riders by death and wounds. But both 



i64 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

previous battle-fields combined showed no such num- 
ber of riderless steeds as Modder River. There were 
literally hundreds of them. I had lost mine in the 
fight, but in the first half-hour of the next morning I 
took my choice of four, and might have made my 
pick from a hundred, saddled and bridled, before I 
had gone half over the field. 

We now know that it was our artillery fire that 
thinned the ranks and broke the nerve of the enemy. 
It was a fearful assault produced by an extraordinary 
discharge of shot and shell. 

The four naval guns fired some five hundred and 
fourteen rounds, the i8th Battery fired eleven hun- 
dred rounds, the 75th fired nine hundred rounds, and the 
62nd five hundred ; or three thousand rounds in all. 
As to the rifle fire, most of our men took into the fight 
one hundred and fifty or one hundred and sixty rounds, 
and the average fire per rifle by the nine battalions 
must have been one hundred rounds. The climax of 
the Boers' desire to vacate the field was reached when 
a stalwart British cheer broke upon their ears at their 
side and in their rear. 

There should not be any confusion as to what men 
raised this cheer and were the first to ford the river ; 
but there is. It is due to the fact that men of several 
ambitious commands composed the first body of ford- 
ers. 

To put history right, the credit of first crossing the 



ECHOES OF MODDER RIVER 165 

river belongs to a small party of Coldstream Guards- 
men who early in the day waded in to their waists, 
and then swam, laden with all their gear and one hun- 
dred and sixty rounds of ammunition. There were 
between twenty-four and forty men in this body, and 
though many won across, two were nearly drowned, 
and all saw that it was wise to return. The river was 
too deep, and when they reached the further shore 
they sank in mud to their knees. 

This happened on the extreme right of the line, 
where Lord Methuen made his first gallant attempt to 
force a passage. 

He tried again on the far left, and it was there that, 
beyond any doubt or dispute. Colonel Barter, of the 
King's Own Yorkshire Light Infantry, got across by 
a fairly good fording-place with a score or two dozen 
men, some of whom were his own, while others were 
men of the Argyll and Sutherlandshire and the North 
Lancashire Regiments. They landed against some 
trenches and an angle of stone wall which were held 
by some three hundred Boers. 

Just as they were crossing a battery of Royal Artil- 
lery rolled up in the rear of our men, and, before it 
had time to unlimber, all the Boers fied, jostling and 
even knocking each other down in eagerness to mount. 
In time our force across the river numbered four hun- 
dred, and Brigadier-General Pole-Carew took command. 
Our own shells and our own rifle fire beat upon this 



i66 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

little band, and it halted and cheered to disclose its 
nationality. 

That is the truth of a heroic movement, of which 
too many versions have been given. 

It is said that the Boers fight in deadly terror of our 
bayonets, which we had not yet had a chance to use 
upon them, and this increased their fever for flight. 
They have also had a wholesome dread of our lyddite 
shells — of which, likewise, we had not yet made any 
use; but at this battle General Cronje, who watched 
the whole fight, supposed our naval guns were firing 
lyddite, and said to his staff, " I've been watching that 
stuff all day, and I don't think much of it." 



CHAPTER XVIII 

FILLING tommy's WATER-BOTTLE 

We knew what fighting was, but we also learned a 
few things about water — we men on Methuen's march. 

When we were over-civilised, and lived in London, 
we made poor jokes at the expense of water, saying 
that it gave laundresses a living, that it was invented 
to float Noah's '* greatest Zoo on earth," and other 
such puerilities. 

We never joke about water now. The first time we 
really appreciated it we were starting out from Orange 
River. The previous night had been so cold that I 
spent it in walking all over several camps, between the 
prostrate bodies of restless, shivering soldiers. Some 
made no pretence of sleeping, but divided their time 
between gathering sticks, and building little fires to 
huddle round while they lasted. 

In time that agony was over; and we were marching, 

and watching the day break. In breaking it seemed 

to rend the earth's blanket of atmosphere, and let the 

sun's heat out upon us as if we were so many thousand 

stokers in the broiling belly of a ship. 

167 



i68 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

On and on we marched, in heavy sand, or over stones, 
or stumbling across furrowed ground — all gasping like 
fishes thrown on a beach. 

At first our lips dried and cracked, then our mouths 
parched, and finally our throats became as if they were 
coated with plaster of Paris. The hair shrivelled on 
our hands, and our feet grew dry as devilled bones. 
Here and there a man fell forward on his hands and 
knees, or stumbled out of the ranks, and lurched prone 
on the veldt. 

In the course of the march some skimpy, light-green 
trees broke the line of the horizon ahead, and put new 
heart in us, for it was to those trees — at a place called 
" Fincham's " — that we were to march. 

Everything has its ending, and at last we came to 
the first of the three verdant clumps of trees. They 
were poplars, and at their feet, darkening under their 
foliage, was a mud-banked pool of dirty water, which 
tailed off to the northward in a tiny, stagnant-looking 
brooklet. Men with horses who had been ahead were 
watering their beasts, and to these our Tommies called, 
as we halted, " Fill this bottle for me, will ye, mate ? " 
But their officers, riding beside them, and ever appre- 
hensive of dysentery and typhoid, called aloud, " Pass 
the order that no one is to drink this water. It will 
only make the men ill." 

My horse showed me how the men regarded this 
order, for all men are but babies of varying growth, 



FILLING TOMMY'S WATER-BOTTLE 169 

and no man is so much of a baby as a horse. He would 
have his drink. Turn his head how I would, or turn it 
how often, back he would go to the edge of the stream. 
He had his way and water, but Tommy did not, for an 
ofHcer's order is stronger than a curbed bit of steel. 

A camp was planned, and the battalions were marched 
to their places. The mess-sergeants and men got out 
their *' dickshees," or Flanders kettles, their food, and 
their firewood to cook our breakfasts, and the transport 
men and grooms leaped bareback on five hundred 
horses, or pulled at strings of mules to take them all 
to water — good water — somewhere ahead. 

With my colonel, C. St. Leger Barter, of the York- 
shire Light Infantry, I walked after the horses — he in 
his neat suit of khaki-coloured serge, of lounging coat 
and riding breeches, with his silver-topped stick in hand, 
I in khaki, with a Mexican sombrero on my head, and 
cowboy " chaps," or gaiters, on my legs — the wonder 
of all who saw them. 

We came to Fincham's, a yellow Spanish-looking 
house, all set about with trees. In and out of its yard 
horses and mules passed in scores, and behind the 
house the Tommies crowded like bees round a honey 
pot, filling their cloth-clad bottles out of a stone tank, 
while other Tommies walked round and round a sort 
of windlass that pumped new water into the tank. 

Every man filled his bottle, emptied it down his 
throat, and filled it again. 



I70 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

A water-mania, a thirst-madness, was upon the 
troops. We paddled in spilled water, and the sounds 
it made in pouring, gurgling, and splashing were as 
pleasant music to all our ears. The colonel and I 
found some two-quart tin canteens — one of which after- 
wards caught the sun on Modder River battle-field, and 
directed the enemy's fire upon me until I put it under 
me out of sight. We filled these canteens, and took 
long drinks out of them ; and then we found a bar-room 
with German lager in bottles, and bought all there was 
— ^but that is a digression. 

We stayed a day or so, and then, one blistering 
afternoon, our column — a many-thousand-legged centi- 
pede — streamed along the thirsty, heat-refracting veldt 
again for Belmont. 

After nightfall, in an amazing, hopeless tangle of 
men and horses and waggons, we squeezed our mass 
between two kopjes, and were nearly two hours in 
getting ourselves together, in boiling some tea, and in 
stretching ourselves on the now cold earth to court a 
little sleep. 

Men and carts kept moving ahead and coming back 
with water — where from most of us did not know. 
But the precious fluid was plentiful. We drank till 
our waistbands cut into us, and then we fell asleep. 

In the chilly night, with a cup of hot cocoa to 
hearten us up, we crept out into the faint moonlight 
shadows of some hills, and by daybreak began to fight 



FILLING TOMMY'S WATER-BOTTLE i;i 

the awful battle of Belmont. I was late in returning 
to camp, for it is my custom to go all over a battle-field 
after a fight. 

But when I did return, what a sight met my eyes ! 

Only a Persian poet could do justice to it. It was 
like the celestial imaginings of a pious Mussulman. 
At the head of the glen where we had camped was an 
oasis of green trees toe-deep in the edges of a pond. 
Near by was a stone tank full of crystal water, and be- 
side it our people had constructed another of white 
canvas, in which the same pure liquid shone like 
melted diamonds, touched with emerald shadows by 
some sprays of foliage above. 

Lines of men were standing beside the tanks dipping 
in their bottles, a line at a time. Other men in scores 
sat in the shade beside the water. Under the trees, 
in the invigorating coolness of their shelter, the bullet- 
riddled, shell-mangled wounded were laid in rows upon 
stretchers, with the doctors and attendants minister- 
ing to them. Meanwhile to the great pool came the 
horses and mules, sucking up gallons of water each, 
and wading in deeper and deeper as they sucked. 

It was indeed a weird picture — the fagged and dusty 
soldiers, the spent horses, the clouds of red powdery 
dust choking us all, the hot, bare veldt reaching away 
for ever in all directions, the horizon trembling and 
dancing before us by reason of the movement of the 
heated air ; finally, the bare, naked African sun, blaz- 



1/2 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

ing down at us as the Boers had been doing earlier in 
the day. 

We marched to Graspan with our water-bottles and 
each regimental water-cart filled, but the Tommies 
made away with their shares as quickly, as Tommy 
does with the food and drink that's given him to keep 
him going for a day or more. 

They fought the battle with parched throats, and 
then discovered that there was only one little well to 
supply us all with more. Around that well hundreds 
gathered, and when the buckets were being emptied 
into the carts the soldiers dipped up the wastage with 
their tins. 

For myself, I got a cup of boiling water from a 
locomotive engine, and sat down to wait till I could 
drink it without being scalded. Ah, how priceless 
water is out here ! Sometimes I thought of men with 
hose pipes drenching Fleet Street and the Strand with 
water in the dead of night. But I could not believe 
my own memory. It did not seem possible that water 
was ever thrown about like that. 

We camped beside a muddy, grassy pond on the way 
to Modder River, and again we revelled in water. We 
actually washed our bodies and changed our clothing, 
and felt more or less like *' just men made perfect." 

On the next afternoon, in the heat of a fearful bat- 
tle, I asked an officer who guarded a water waggon of 
the Coldstream Guards to let me fill my bottle. 



FILLING TOMMY'S WATER-BOTTLE 173 

" We have not enough for our own men," said he. 

" It was to your wounded men that I gave what I 
had," said I, turning away. 

" Please come back and fill your bottle," said he ; 
*' you may have all you want." 

Twenty minutes later more wounded men crawling 
to the rear began again to cross my path and beg for 
water. 

" Please, sir, could you give me a little water ? " 

'* That man over there has had one foot torn away. 
Could you spare him a drink of water ? " 

" Hello ! How are you wounded ? Can I do any- 
thing for you ? " 

" Give me some water, sir, for God's sake ; that's all 
I want." 

We had learned what war is, and more about the 
Boer than we knew a month ago ; but, above all, we 
had learned the value of water. 



CHAPTER XIX 

BATTLE OF MAAGHERSFONTEIN 

It was the morning of December nth. 

We had pushed on one hundred and twenty miles 
from the advanced base at De Aar, and marched more 
than forty miles into the enemy's field, though all of 
it was within one of the Crown colonies. 

Three times the enemy had opposed us, each time 
teaching us more and more about their methods, their 
stubbornness, and the queer game they play of facing 
us as long as they can damage us, and retiring as we 
reach the moment when we expect to demolish them. 
But each time the fact remained that we had forced 
them out of their superb and shrewdly-chosen posi- 
tions. 

They learned a great deal in these reverses. They 
discovered that, sprinkle themselves as they would 
over the sheer face of a rock-strewn hill, and hide as 
they might among the rocks to shoot us in the open, 
or while we exposed ourselves on their hills, our 
valour would still lead us to storm their eyries and 
rush upon their soldiers regardless of their superior 
174 



BATTLE OF MAAGHERSFONTEIN 175 

numbers, their torrents of bullets, and their almost 
unbroken cover. 

Our officers had been taught at Sandhurst that to 
attack an intrenched foe successfully requires a force 
three times as strong as the defenders. But we 
forged ahead, as indifferent to such maxims as to the 
odds heaped high against us. 

The profit the Boer took from this lesson he applied 
at Modder River for the first time in his history. 
Our shells had searched behind and between his 
adamantine shelters, and our soldiers had climbed up 
and into them, like lions which seek their prey in its 
most secret lairs. 

Therefore the Boer, at Modder River, abandoned 
his rocks from behind which he had thought to blow 
the British into the sea, and ensconced himself in a line 
of trenches on the open veldt — trenches fringed with 
boughs and branches, which melted into the line of 
riverside trees behind them. 

When we advanced to the next battle, near here, at 
Maaghersfontein, we had seen a great kopje swarming 
with the foe, and imagined it the place where we were 
to fight them — but this exhibition of their surplus 
numbers proved a mere blind. Their mass was in 
trenches on the veldt ; the hill was merely where they 
placed their guns and kept their reinforcements. 

After the Modder River fight, on November 28th, 
Lord Methuen halted us in camp until December loth, 



1/6 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

waiting, we believe, for the battalions of the Highland 
Brigade, for the great naval gun and the howitzer 
battery, which use lyddite, and for the sorely-needed 
cavalry, which came to us in the form of the I2th 
Lancers. The valiant Ninth Brigade of Yorkshire 
Light Infantry, 5th Northumberlands, Loyal North 
Lancashires, Northamptonshires, 9th Lancers, and 
Mounted Infantry, which had done such gallant work 
in the previous battles, were now to be scattered, and 
in some measure supplanted, by the Argylls, Seaforths, 
Gordons, Black Watch, and Highland Light Infantry 
of the fresher brigade. They were to take the centre, 
and form the bulk of the attacking line with the 
Guards' Brigade. 

The King's Own Yorkshire Light Infantry, the 
Mounted Infantry, and the 5th Fusiliers were to form 
the extreme right, and part of the Northampton Regi- 
ment was down at Graspan, where it had so bravely 
resisted those Boers who had cut our railway line and 
telegraph only a few days before ; but the bulk of the 
hardened brigade were to remain in the Modder River 
camp, and hold this position against a rear attack 
during the Maaghersfontein combat. 

On the afternoon of Sunday, the loth, the great 4*7 
gun, with its crew of short and stocky sailormen in 
broad-rimmed straw hats covered with khaki, was 
dragged by thirty-six oxen, and escorted by men of 
the 5th Fusiliers, to a ridge three miles north of this 



BATTLE OF MAAGHERSFONTEIN 177 

camp, overlooking the kopje infested by the Boers. 
The great gun shelled the hill wherever it was thought 
that the Boers could be seen, at ranges varying between 
six thousand and eight thousand yards. 

Shells tore through the air with precisely the noise 
of an express train rushing at full speed, and when 
they burst they seemed to envelope an acre of ground 
in heavy brown smoke, which lifted and floated over 
the kopje as if it were a mass of the pulverised earth. 
It was said that windows three and a half miles away 
were rattled by each discharge. The noise was like 
the bark of a monster bull-dog, and the bursting of each 
shell sounded like the cough of a giant. 

The Tommies dubbed the gun *'Joey," and thus 
introduced humour into a campaign that had been 
strangely deficient in that helpful element, as well as 
placed a nickname where it must stick while this war 
should last. 

It is believed that our shells fell among the Boers 

several times during the afternoon. The gun remained 

on the ridge all night, and defined the extreme left of 

the next day's battle-ground. This ground extended 

from the railway where the gun stood, along the ridge 

facing the Boer kopje, and then, when the ridge ended, 

straight over the veldt to the river, and along the river 

two miles, to the southernmost of two bridle fords to 

the Free State side of the stream. 

This position was four miles long from railway to 
12 



1/8 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

river, and two miles longer beside the river. The 
ground was different from any on which we had fought 
before. It was all littered — ridges and veldt alike — 
with what the Boers call Vaal bushes, shapely little 
trees from four to seven feet high, of round, full, gen- 
erous outline and dense foliage, every leaf in which is 
a silvery green. 

In such a veldt before their hill the Boers had two 
miles of trenches full of men. Beyond this, still to 
the right, their trenches continued across the more 
level and open plain, and then bent at right angles, 
and followed the river on our side, keeping between us 
and it. 

Thus the trenches protected the kopje first, and 
gave the Boers freedom to move behind those on the 
level veldt, in full exposure, yet out of range of our 
fire, so that they could get to a waggon ford within 
their lines, and across the river, and down it towards 
Jacobsdal. 

It was not two o'clock in the morning when the last 
troops to leave the camp moved forward to the edge 
of the next scene of battle three miles away. The 
Highland Brigade was ordered to the main position, 
roughly speaking from the left to the centre. The 
Guards' Brigade was to continue the line to the river 
on the right, and the Yorkshires held the drift on the 
extreme right, with a small break between them and 
the Guards. A small force of the Mounted Infantry 



BATTLE OF MAAGHERSFONTEIN 179 

supported the Yorkshires. The main body of this 
mounted troop went into battle with the Highland 
Brigade. 

At about half-past three o'clock in the morning, 
after a rainy and bitterly cold night, the Highland 
Brigade, led by General Wauchope, moved down upon 
the veldt. It was very dark and still intensely 
cold. 

The men advanced in quarter-column order. It is 
not a matter of military importance, but it is a fact 
that they supposed they were to cross the veldt and 
attack the enemy on the kopje. Therefore it hap- 
pened that they were at perfect ease, swinging along 
without a thought of immediate attack, chatting — 
even to such an extent that their officers bade them 
make less noise. Neither officers nor men knew of 
the existence of the formidable trenches that ran along 
the veldt in front of them. 

By one of those unfortunate and irreparable acci- 
dents which happen rarely in the British army two of 
the men loosed their guns during this short march, and 
many critics and historians may say that this apprised 
the Boers of the British approach. It is my belief, 
however, based on good authority, that the Boers em- 
ployed a scout to walk ahead and on the extreme 
right of the British, and flash a light when they reached 
a certain point which had been agreed upon. 

The Scotch battalions — excepting the Gordons, who 



i8o TOWARDS PRETORIA 

did not go into battle until later — kept in quarter- 
column formation, and meeting a line of Vaal bushes, 
and later a thicket of thorny cactus, deployed out of 
the way of and around these. 

Suddenly the light was flashed on the right, a Boer 
rifle was fired on the left, and the whole long-hidden 
trench belched flame, and riddled our ranks with bul- 
lets. 

Nothing could have been more of a surprise, more 
unexpected. 

A panic seized the troops, and would have possessed 
any other regiments in any other army — so fearful was 
the fire, so completely were the men taken off their 
guard, and so like a general slaughter must it have 
seemed to those who saw their comrades dropping on 
both sides, and before them. 

They turned and ran, literally colliding and climbing 
over one another in their confusion. 

A chaplain forward in the ranks was knocked down 
and trampled ; as brave a man as any, and yet one 
who declared that there lived no men who could have 
behaved differently. 

It had been as if the earth had opened, and from a 
cleft that ran as far as our men reached fire had 
belched, and shot had swept the veldt. 

Out of two companies of the Black Watch only fifty 
men escaped ; more than three hundred were the 
casualties in that regiment. 



BATTLE OF MAAGHERSFONTEIN i8i 

It was the same with the Seaforths, and almost the 
same with the others. 

The fever of fright lasted only while the men ran 
two hundred yards, and then they regained some 
measure of order. 

Most of them re-formed their ranks, fell under the 
commands of their officers, and faced the foe, lying 
down of course, as must be the case in such warfare. 

Even then our advance line was only three hundred 
and twenty to four hundred yards from the trenches, 
so close had the Boers allowed us to approach before 
they revealed themselves. 

In this incident lay the pith and almost the sum of 
the battle as far as the infantry were concerned. Our 
casualties at the end of a day of fifteen hours were 
about nine hundred, and yet not above a hundred of 
these were inflicted upon us after that first three min- 
utes — three minutes which saw the equal of a battalion 
swept away ! 

Then the Guards' Brigade advanced on the right to 
a point at which they could have demolished a visible 
enemy, and there they waged hot battle all that day. 

The Gordons were sent forward early in the day, 
and met with a thrilling adventure at the start. Their 
route took them to the middle of the field, where they 
passed a Boer trench without provoking attack, or 
sign of its existence. After they had gone by, and 
begun to meet the fierce fire of the foe in the main 



i82 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

entrenchment ahead of them, the Boers in the rear 
trench, who were slightly to the right, opened an en- 
filading fire, so that they were battered with volleys 
from front, rear, and side. They fell upon their faces 
after a loss which seems trifling beside that of their 
compatriots earlier in the day — thirty or forty casu- 
alties of all kinds. 

A more characteristic incident, far more agreeable 
to record, was that which occurred still later in the 
day, when a composite party of Scotchmen — Argyles, 
Seaforths, and others — actually advanced to the Boer 
trenches, inflicting more damage than they suffered. 

But it was an artillery fight, and had been planned 
as such. The Boers used few guns. Taught by past 
experience that their guns have played a small part as 
aids to them, and on the other hand, have always 
drawn heavy and accurate fire from us, they brought 
only four into action. They had two in use on the 
kopje, and one in the rear of their centre on the veldt, 
but they did us no damage with either. 

We, on the other hand, made splendid use of our 
great naval gun, our howitzer battery, horse artillery, 
and three field batteries of the Royal Artillery. The 
great gun directed its fire mainly on the kopje, and 
we were told afterwards that the damage it did was 
very great. It is said that one shell fell among forty 
Boers, of whom only five remained unhurt. Another 
destroyed a laager. It seemed that by the close of 



BATTLE OF MAAGHERSFONTEIN 183 

the day nearly the whole face of the hill had been 
under this fire. 

The howitzer battery helped in the work, and shelled 
the trenches as well. The horse artillery was actually 
brought into the heavy rifle fire of the enemy, and 
raked their trenches lengthwise and crosswise with 
terrible effect. This action was carried out in the very 
jaws of death, and then, as from our first battle to our 
last, the pluck and intrepidity of our artillerymen im- 
pressed every soldier among us. 

At half-past four o'clock large numbers of Boers 
were seen leaving the farther side of the kopje, and 
moving toward the river and Free State border. 
Whether they were retreating, which was probably 
the fact, or were setting out to attempt a flank attack 
upon our position, we did not know. That such an 
attack was in their minds we strongly suspected. At 
all events, they found the Guards and the King's Own 
Yorkshires controlling the drifts, and stoutly resisting 
the Boer fire all along the river. A very fierce attack 
was made upon their extreme right in an undoubted 
effort to break through our line and flank us. 

Five companies of the Yorkshires were moved up to 
support them at this point, and the Boers abandoned 
their project. The Yorkshiremen had not disappointed 
those who had learned to look to them for valorous 
activity in every fight. They had been sent to guard 
a drift, and had found the Boers not only holding it, 



i84 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

but also in possession of a ridge and two houses that 
were upon it well on the near side of the river. The 
Yorkshiremen stormed this ridge and took it. Their 
casualties for the whole day were only nine. Lord 
Methuen complimented them upon their part in the 
battle. 

On this part of the field — the extreme right — the 
mounted infantry were bringing in the wounded to- 
wards the close of the day, when the Boers attacked 
them furiously. Three of the mounted infantry — all 
men of the Yorkshire Regiment serving in the mounted 
corps— are declared to have made it possible for this 
humane work to continue. They are Sergeant Cassen, 
Lance-Corporal Bennett, and Private Mawhood. They 
knelt down time after time in the open, and with utter 
disregard for their own lives did all they could by 
firing continuously and steadily. 

There was no lack of courage on that great field, 
and it distinguished high and humble alike. Now it 
was the colonel of the Gordons standing erect and 
calling on his men until a bullet felled him ; now the 
Scotch private, who was found with his foot smashed, 
and was carried away by stretcher-bearers, while he 
loudly protested that he had been wounded twelve 
hours, had kept on fighting all the time, and was still 
as fit as any man to face the foe. 

At sundown our infantry retired. It is true that a 
large fraction — the major part, perhaps — of the Boers 



BATTLE OF MAAGHERSFONTEIN 185 

had done the same an hour earlier. They fired a few- 
shells at us as we withdrew, and our guns answered 
them, and so were able to claim the last notes in the 
tumult of battle. 

On the next day and the next we gathered in our 
dead ; roughly speaking but little over a hundred, 
though scattered over six miles of the veldt. The 
Boers searched our ambulance and stretcher men, and 
blindfolded all whose duty led them near the trenches. 
Unfortunately, one man was found with a revolver 
upon him, and he and the surgeon-major in charge of the 
party were taken prisoners, and led into the Boer camp. 

But for his manner, the Red Cross man who had 
carried a pistol might have been set free as the doctor 
was, but he irritated the Boers, and they sent him to 
Pretoria. This incident over, the relations between 
the Boers and our ambulance people assumed a very 
agreeable phase. The Boers were courteous, helpful, 
and respectful. By not one word did they give of- 
fence. This was evidently the effect of our unfailing 
fairness throughout the war, of our generosity when 
they asked for medical aid after earlier battles, of the 
dignified tone in which Lord Methuen had complained 
of their earlier breaches of the conventions of civilised 
warfare. 

Unquestionably the most shocking episode of the 
war on the western side of the continent was the dis- 
aster to the Highland Brigade at Maaghersfontein. 



i86 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

The catastrophe was so peculiar that, had the cen- 
sorship permitted an account of it to be cabled home, 
it would have been difficult to deal with it. There 
were two good reasons for this. In the first place, it 
was no easy matter to judge how much could be made 
public without lasting injury to the Scotch regiments, 
for the shock they suffered was far greater than has 
been made known. 

Lord Methuen, too, maintained absolute silence, 
while the Scotch camps rang with criticism, and even 
denunciation, of the part he was suspected of having 
taken. This was natural in men who had suffered as 
they had — indeed, even if it was misapplied, their 
strength of feeling at such a moment did them 
credit. 

The truth, and, in all probability, a great deal be- 
yond the truth, respecting certain phases of the disas- 
ter has been exploited in published letters, written by 
private soldiers to their people at home, and there is 
no longer need for such reticence as was reasonable 
before these events had passed into the province of 
history. Even now, without Lord Methuen's version, 
the sad story must be incomplete. 

The Scotch maintain that when General Wauchope 
returned to his quarters on the night before the 
battle, after receiving his orders from Lord Methuen, 
he was seen to be troubled. 

To one of his intimates he is said to have remarked 



BATTLE OF MAAGHERSFONTEIN 187 

that his instructions were so vague that he protested, 
and asked for fuller, more definite orders, and that 
Lord Methuen was displeased, and in reply reminded 
him that as chief in command he had given what orders 
seemed best to him. 

The Scotch account goes on to say that in obedi- 
ence to these orders the Brigade was moved forward 
into battle in quarter-column formation. 

During the march it is said that General Wauchope 
exclaimed more than once, " this is madness ! " "Fi- 
nally, just before the disaster, he declared again that 
to advance as he was doing, in close formation, against 
an unlocated enemy, was mad business, and that, 
orders or no orders, he would spread his men out in 
open formation. 

He gave the order. It was carried to the first bat- 
talion, the Black Watch, but before it could be exe- 
cuted the troops '' found themselves in a butcher's 
shop," as one Scotch Tommy expressed it. 

Some have said that the Boers had allowed our 
men to approach to within fifty yards of their 
trenches, but the distance varies with every account 
from fifty to three hundred yards. The men, who 
were seized with panic, saw their comrades fall on 
either side and in front of them, and — they ran. 

It is needless to enlarge upon that distressing event. 
They ran back. They were overcome. They did 
not distinguish between their ofificers and their com- 



i88 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

rades. There was panic, disorder, chaos. They had 
suffered a surprise and a shock such as perhaps no such 
mass of men has known in modern times. 

Whoever criticises them must remember that on 
many terrible fields, through a long and glorious his- 
tory, they have won the right to be regarded as among 
the bravest troops in the world. 

When the disaster occurred — according to the 
Scotch story — General Wauchope said, " I hope my 
men will not hold me responsible for this." 

Whether he was shot early in the struggle or some 
hours later no one appears to be certain. Most of his 
faithful followers think that he was among the first to 
die, but I have never heard that this pious belief rests 
upon the word of any witness. 

On the other hand, one private declares that some 
hours after the first shock of the fight the General, 
restive under the too-prolonged tension caused by the 
incessant fire of the Boers, declared that he was going 
to jump up, run back, and reassume the active con- 
duct of his brigade. He did so, according to this ac- 
count, accompanied by four other men, two of whom 
were slain then with their brave General. I cannot 
vouch for either account from my own knowledge, but 
just as one refrains from painting the complete picture 
of the consequences of the first shock to the High- 
landers, so must one curb all inclination to picture 
the subsequent grief of the Brigade, and its anger 



BATTLE OF MAAGHERSFONTEIN 189 

against those to whom the men attributed their ill 
fortune. 

Two points must be cleared up before the full truth 
can be got at. First, did or did not General Wauchope 
believe he was to advance a great distance farther than 
the point where he was attacked, to an entirely differ 
ent part of the field, over to the right of the kopje and 
around it ? Next, did he know that the Boers were 
intrenched on the veldt in front of the kopjs ; or 
did Methuen know this and omit to make it clear to 
Wauchope ? 

Outside the Scotch Brigade it is said that both the 
Lieutenant-General and the Brigadier-General knew 
the fact, but the Scotch are convinced this was not 
the case, and so, rather than trespass on angry ground, 
it is best to leave the question open, as indeed it is. 

More absurdities, and even downright inventions 
and lies, have been current about this matter than 
about anything else that has taken place in the war, 
but as I have enjoyed peculiar facilities for learning 
whatever is reliable, I trust that my statement of 
what actually took place will be found to be so clear, 
and void of ornament and bias, as not to call for 
contradiction or correction in any important detail. 

Some idea of the terrors of the situation in which 
the Highlanders found themselves, while marching 
wholly unprepared for assault, may be gained from 
the following figures, the record of a surprise and 



I go 



TOWARDS PRETORIA 



attack which lasted only a minute, or at the most 
three minutes. The much slighter losses of the Gor- 
dons, who escaped this awful trap, are purposely 
excluded from the calculation. 



Regiment. 


Officers 

and Men 

Killed. 


Wounded. 


Missing. 


Prisoners. 


Total 


2nd Black Watch 

Highland Light Infantry. 

ist Argyll & Sutherland- 
shires 


73 
15 
26 
48 


218 ^ 

77 

61 

141 


38 

3 

18 


25 

I 

8 


354 
95 
91 


2nd Seaf orths 


212 


Totals 


162 


497 


59" 


34" 


752 





It must be understood distinctly that quite a differ- 
ent account of this disaster is given by the men of the 
42nd, or Black Watch, who deny that they can be 
justly associated with the panic which seized portions 
of the brigade. 

They insist that they had already begun to carry 
out General Wauchope's order for a wider and looser 
formation, and that when the shock came their ranks 

1 In this number (218) are 10 wounded men taken prisoners by the 
Boers. 

2 The Boers took 79 prisoners, including 10 wounded and 14 whose 
names were given to the British immediately after the battle. The names 
of the rest were not known to the enemy. They claimed to have buried 
1 5 Highlanders, and this number, with the 45 prisoners whose names 
were not known, would account for one more than the 59 missing. 



BATTLE OF MAAGHERSFONTEIN 191 

were over-lapping at the ends, as one moved forward 
to extend the one in front. 

They assert that they then lay down, and kept their 
position, very few joining in the retiring movement. 

They say further that the men of their battalion, 
who were found dead in such numbers close to the 
Boer trenches, were not killed by the first surprising 
fire, but met death during the after-course of the 
battle. 

The Seaforths also claim to have held their position 
through the awful catastrophe, and an officer of note, 
whose name I am not at liberty to mention, says that 
it seems to him that the Black Watch and the Sea- 
forths presented very nearly their full strength, as he 
saw them shortly after the great shock. 

This officer received some orders from General 
Wauchope soon after the surprise. He went off to 
deliver them, returned in a very few minutes, and 
could then see nothing of the General. He himself 
fell wounded at the moment, and knows no more. 

There are as many stories as there were men in the 
battle, and I pass over all but the above, which come 
from such sources, and are so blended with a demand 
for justice to those who missed the panic, that I in- 
clude them rather than even seem unfair. 



CHAPTER XX 

THE MESS OF THE WESSEX FUSILIERS 

It was interesting, when no actual fighting was afoot, 
to notice the social habits of our gallant officers. 

We are at mess with, let us say, the Wessex Fusiliers. 

This officers* mess is very proud of itself, because it 
has commandeered a lot of boards, and built a table 
twenty feet long and three feet wide, with a bench 
running along either side of it. Next it has borrowed 
the canvas cover of an ammunition waggon, and spread 
this out over six posts so as to shade the table at high 
noon. 

In the morning the fierce African sun blinds all who 
are on the southern side of the table, and in the after- 
noon the ferocious glow of it broils and dizzies all who 
sit on the northern bench. If we move our legs along 
the boards we get splinters in them. If we lean on the 
table we get jam-stains on our khaki sleeves. But 
that doesn't matter much now. If you had lost 
a company in three rounds of the war, if you had 
missed your bravest companions, and sent their things 

home to their wives, or down to the hospital at Wyn- 
192 



MESS OF THE WESSEX FUSILIERS 193 

berg, if you thought the chances were that you would 
not be ahve yourself the day after to-morrow, what 
would you care whether you ripped your breeches on 
a nail, or whether it was marmalade or Cape jam that 
has stuck your coat-sleeve to the table ? 

The colonel is a stickler for promptness. If you are 
going to sit with frizzled eyeballs at his mess, if you 
are going to tear your breeches and soil your sleeves 
at his table you must be there sharp at six. Then you 
will be invited up close to him, where you can use his 
funny little mustard-pot that looks like a box of oint- 
ment, and you can borrow his big tablespoon to stir 
your sugar in your tea, while the majors and the cap- 
tains look on green with envy — and maybe the colonel 
will fill his sparklet with diluted mud and a Mauser 
bullet full of carbolic gas, to drive your whisky and 
mud and sand down your throat — your chicken-like 
throat which has swallowed sand until it might be a 
tube of emery-paper. 

" Don't walk on the windward side of the table — 
you, I mean," says the colonel to a soldier servant. 
" What's your name ? Well, you're always kicking 
up the sand and letting it blow all over our food." 
(Then turning to his guests) : '* Now, in India, the 
native servants " 

'' I heard the firing this afternoon," says the major 
to a captain across the table ; " scouting party of the 
Lancers, eh ? Any one hurt ? " 
13 



194 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

" All got away but one," says the captain. " Dum- 
fries was killed with the first shot. At that the others 
ran — except a private, who dragged the captain out 
of range. But he was dead ; they only saved his 
body." 

" What's that ? " says the colonel ; *' not Dumfries, 
who led those fellows so well at Belmont ? I'm really 
very sorry." 

" He was cousin to Mannering of ' ours,' sir," says 
somebody at the far end of the table, " and Manner- 
ing had invited him to dine here to-night." 

" Really, sir," says the major, " that cook of ours 
does make excellent soup. Never tasted better in my 
life." 

" Bolter always said so, too," says the colonel. 
** Harris, you saw the adjutant last. How is he ? Not 
very serious, I hope." 

" The doctor told me he could not rejoin us for some 
months, sir; he's pretty bad." 

'' Ah," says the colonel ; '' he'll hate to lose the rest 
of this. All the men will miss him, but not so much 
as he will miss seeing this show out." 

*' By George," say I ; " what is war ? Is it dehu- 
manising ? What is soldiering ? Does it make men 
wooden? Here I've been miserably broken up for 
days about the adjutant, and you talk about his get- 
ting three serious wounds as you would talk about an 
eclipse of the moon." 



MESS OF THE WESSEX FUSILIERS 195 

"Don't misjudge us," says the captain next to me. 
" We are used to killing and wounding, and we learn 
to seem to treat it lightly. It's only seeming, I assure 
you. If a man's shot here in battle we say little be- 
cause we have to set an example to the subalterns 
and the men. Nothing else would do. If men of less 
intimacy with us died on the polo ground, or in their 
beds at home, and we were in times of peace, you 
would see whether we are wood " 

''The soup is good enough," says a voice half-way 
down the table, " but it's nothing — it's not a patch on 
the way Weldon would cook it. Devil as he is in 
barracks, and up to mischief as he is — up to his neck 
— when nothing's on, he is a wonder to cook." 

" Gentlemen," says the colonel, " there are no smokes 
in the mess. We have sent to Logan's car, and there 
are none to be had there. But I have — Bedford, get 
my cigarettes from out of my dickshee in my tent. 
They are done up in a towel under the dishes because 
some pilferer — some Kaffir, I suspect — took my other 
box. When they come I'll ask each of you to take 
two and pass the box along. Why, Major — bless me, 
I thought you were not coming. Gentlemen, Major 
Downrig. We have finished dinner. Really, you 
should come at the proper time. I told you twice 
that we dine sharp at six. However, if you will come 
late you must not expect anything. Bedford — Bed- 
ford ! where the deuce is Bedford ? I say, Private 



T96 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

Hammond, go and tell the mess sergeant that I have 
a friend to dine with me, and I hope there is some 
soup — the soup was excellent, Major, but now it is 
probably like ice water and tallow — and, Hammond, 
tell the sergeant to serve whatever there is. The 
potatoes were very fine — and there should be some of 
that rabbit the men caught — and bring back the 
pickles. Major, you really should not come at half- 
past seven when dinner is at six." 

" Upon my word, it is too bad," the major replied ; 
" but, you see, it was for all the world like going back 
to Tirah. I was out with Colonel Rose to locate a 
place for a heliograph, and suddenly we were being 
sniped. We had two of Rimington's men with us, 
and one was copped, and the other had his horse shot, 
and then he was bowled over himself, dead as a door- 
nail." 

" By Jove ! you don't say ? " 

" But I do, and I was an hour getting help, and 
getting the body away. However, we got it, and 
here we are, thank God, and Fm none the worse, 
though they did give us a surprise — that I can swear. 
Why, how do you do, Mr. Daily Mail? Thank you 
very much for the Nestors. 'Pon my word, I never 
can thank you enough. I was down to Boer tobacco 
when you sent them — and Fm the man who swore 
that if any man smoked Boer tobacco in my club I'd 
cut him, if he was my best friend." 



MESS OF THE WESSEX FUSILIERS 197 

It was my pet dandy, and I had not recognised him 
• — the man I used to see at Orange River, in new khaki 
serge, with blazing stars on his shoulders, with lustrous 
buttons, with gaiters and boots freshly dressed twice 
a day, with gloves — the only man who wore gloves as 
far north as Orange River ; with rings, and a jewelled 
flask, and a provoking habit of taking everybody to 
his tent to see his Pasteur filter and his aluminium 
eating kit ; the dazzling dandy of Methuen's column. 

And now — now that dandies are as extinct as dodoes 
— is it any wonder I did not know him ? His stars 
were gone. His buttons were dingy. His coat was 
stained, and the left-hand pocket was torn half-way 
down. His single eyeglass was as murky as a White- 
chapel window in December. He had not shaved for 
weeks. He was sitting on splinters, and leaning on 
Cape jam, and he didn't care. He was like the rest of 
us — dirty, shabby, unkempt, unshorn. He was capa- 
ble of writing to the Hon. Lady Anne Broadstairs, 
but not of letting her see him. He was like the rest 
of us, blending with the veldt, melting into the desert 
colour, going without a razor, a bath, or a brush of 
any sort. But he was none the worse for that, and, 
pray God, may no one think any of us are. 

" I always shave before going into action," said the 
colonel, "on account of the example to the men." 

" I used to," said the major, " till the men stole my 
razors. But, 'pon honour, old man, I do wash. I 



198 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

washed all over — let me see when it was. Oh, yes, it 
was at Honey Nest Kloof, the day before Modder 
River fight. I got two buckets, and went out two 
hundred yards away from the camp, and I stripped 
and — no, first I washed my undershirt and shirt in 
one pail, and then I washed myself. It was a rude 
shock to me, but no harm came of it." 



CHAPTER XXI 

THE PADRE AND OUR FRIEND THE ENEMY 

The man of us all who knew the foe best was Padre 
Robertson, chaplain of the Highland Brigade, welcome 
mess-fellow with valiant Wauchope, man among men, 
and man of God. 

Towards the close of each battle, before the Boers 
had done killing us, and before we had stopped firing 
at nothing all day long. Padre Robertson mounted a 
horse and rode over to the enemy's lines to ask per- 
mission to gather in our dead and wounded. 

" I knew they wouldn't harm me," he said to me 
once, " because they could see by my riding right up 
to them that I was either a minister or a madman." 

Ah, but there's good stuff in our padres ! Think of 

the behaviour of the one called Hill at Belmont. The 

Grenadiers were still scaling the steep and rocky kopje 

like flies, and the leaden drift of bullets was still 

whistling down from the Boer eyries as the wind of 

a gale searches the deck and rigging of a ship. But 

Padre Hill was there, moving from man to man, lifting 

a head here, and giving water there, and, once, actually 

199 



200 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

standing up, book in hand, reading the office for the 
dying. 

** Go back, padre, go back ! '' said an officer, *' this is 
no place for a man of your calling ; you've no right to 
risk your life here/' 

" No," said he, ^' I'm in my right place here." 

But, as I was about to say, Padre Robertson went 
over to the Boer lines either three or four days after 
the battle of Maaghersfontein, and got to know more 
about the enemy in action than any man I have yet 
seen. He told me that there were Englishmen, Irish- 
men, and Scotchmen among them, as well as the mer- 
cenary Germans and Scandinavians, serving for a gold 
Kruger a day — which is to say a pound sterling Dutch. 
He found ministers among them of the Reformed Pres- 
byterian, or Dutch Reformed, faith, who got their 
professional training in Scotland. Everybody was 
courteous to our padre, and he found many well-dressed 
men of polished manners, distinctly men of the better 
class. Some tried to argue, saying that the war was 
being waged for the sake of a few capitalists and 
mining speculators, but our padre would not argue. 

" I am neither a politeecian nor a soldier," said he, 
with his rich accent, '' I am but joost a meenister o* 
God, come to fetch away the dead." 

They blindfolded all the ambulancemen and stretch- 
er-bearers who were obliged to go within five hun- 
dred yards of their trenches, and led them hither and 



THE PADRE AND THE ENEMY 201 

thither to gather the dead, but they did not blindfold 
the padre. Nor did they put him under oath as to 
what he might tell or hide. One day they said that if 
he would give his word to bring back a list of the 
Boers taken by us they would furnish such a list of 
the English whom they held. 

He carried out his promise, and perceived that they 
have a nearly perfect identification department, and 
system of tracing all who are in their army, no matter 
what befalls them ; and this is a department not pos- 
sessed by every other army in the world, to put the 
case so as not to offend any one in particular. 

It has been told how, when this humane work was 
going on, on the morning after the day of battle, our 
big naval gun burst out, and flung a lyddite shell over 
into the enemy's lines. The Boers were surprised and 
nonplussed at that, but the padre assured them it was 
all a mistake, and cantered back to his own lines to 
have the firing stopped. 

"You'll become a Boer yet," said an ofificer of high 
rank, "if you keep going over to them after each 
fight." 

" No fear of that," said the padre, " but I'm bound 
to say they've been very courteous and good and kind 
to me, and very helpful as well." 

His experiences in that field were almost too shock- 
ing for description. The sun was playing havoc with 
the dead, and the ambulance men, uninspired with the 



202 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

fervent zeal of our padre, turned sick, and were only 
kept in a condition to work by a liberal supply of spirits. 

On the final day even the padre was overcome, and 
then — what do you think? Some kindly Boers came 
out of the trenches and held his head, until the first 
violence of the nausea was spent. 

From an ambulance man I heard an anecdote of 
quaint flavour. The Boers rode out to him and chatted 
with him as he did his work. 

" Have you any water in your bottle ? " they asked, 
adding, " we are very thirsty." 

The Briton said he had water in one bottle, and 
whisky and water in another. 

" I'll give you the whisky and water," said he, " if 
you'll say, * God bless the Queen.' " 

" We've no objection," one Boer replied ; " we've 
nothing against the Queen. Let's have the whisky." 

He lifted the khaki-clad bottle, drank, and said, 
*' God bless the Queen." The second man took the 
bottle, drank a deep draught, and echoed the prayer 
of the first. The third man kept the promise — but in 
a peculiar way. He drank, and, pausing before he 
handed back the bottle, said, " God bless the Queen, 
and Cecil Rhodes." 

I talked to several of our men during the days when 
we were taking in our dead and wounded, and heard 
much about the Boers. Not one had been seen to 
wear a uniform. They were clad precisely as so many 



THE PADRE AND THE ENEMY 203 

men would be if gathered up in city streets and country 
roads. After they left the trenches it was seen that 
every man had a horse, that nearly all the horses were 
very good ones, and that the Boers sat them like cen- 
taurs, *^ so graceful and easy-like," as one man put it. 

When we get to the point Avhere we can write and 
speak freely of the Boer's defects, it will be time to 
tell the other side of the story of the Boer upon the 
battle-field. For there is another side — no matter how 
"gude and helpfu' and courteous" they have been to 
brave Padre Robertson. 



CHAPTER XXII 

CHRISTMAS WITH METHUEN'S ARMY 

" The Boers are going to their homes to spend 
Christmas," was the news we read one day from all 
the points where our armies were centred. Some men 
might have been cross, or even jealous, under the cir- 
cumstances ; but we saw the humour of the situation, 
realising that even if we could slip out of our trenches 
to foregather with our loved ones at home, we should 
have to travel four weeks, and seven thousand miles to 
clasp hands with them. 

Of course, we of Lord Methuen's army celebrated 
the day after our own fashion, and worked ourselves 
up to enjoy it almost as if it were the genuine article. 

I shall describe the day in camp, and though most 
of its features were precisely the same as they would 
have been on any other day, the record may be none 
the less interesting on that account. 

After you have lived in a tent a few weeks, if you 

can call it living, the untying of the flap is as certain 

to wake you as would be the smashing in of your front 

door in London. You hear the strings being pulled 
204 



CHRISTMAS WITH METHUEN'S ARMY 205 

out of their bow knots, and presently there is the 
squeezing, surging noise of a man pushing his way in, 
as if you were Hving in a drum, and he was breaking 
through it. He is your soldier servant, and he re- 
marks, " Gun fire, sir ; I've brought your cocoa, sir." 

Your soldier servant ! What a good fellow he is ! 
You were told before you took him into your employ 
at eighteenpence a day that he was not precisely with- 
out a mark against his name, that at home in barracks 
he was one of the dare-devils of the battalion — apt to 
slip out of a second or third story window, and come 
back tipsy, and say to some ofificer he met, " Good 

morning, sir ; you're a good soldier, sir." But if 

you didn't mind these eccentricities, and would employ 
him, you would find him willing, clever, respectful, 
worth his weight in gold as a servant, precisely as he 
is worth the same amount as a fighting man. 

" And I have brought your cocoa, sir," he says. " I 
was out on picket all night, sir ; but I got sent in this 
morning ahead of the rest with a message, sir. Had a 
bit of fun last night, sir. My captain happened to 
mention that he might be hungry an hour or two after 
dark, as he hadn't had nothing all day. So me and 
another chap we came across a house, and we came 
across a duck and a pigeon and a hen, and then we 
looked for some vegetables, and came across some 
potatoes and onions and carrots. And then we came 
across a pot to cook 'em in, and a couple of plates, sir 



2o6 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

— which came in very handy. And when the captain 
came along he said we gave him the finest ' raggoo ' he 
believed he had ever eat, sir. He said he wouldn't 
ask no questions how we had come across such things 
as was in the * raggoo,' and as he didn't ask any ques- 
tions he didn't get no lies. 

'' Breakfast at half-past six, sir ; shall I call you at 
six?" 

" Do," and with the word I sink back into slumber 
between my goatskin carosse and my blanket, both 
still necessary, for the night was bitter cold, and the 
sun has not yet warmed the air. 

At six the servant comes again with a bucket of 
water, so coated with dust that the fluid is the colour 
of khaki. But what of that ? So is the soap, and so 
is the towel — indeed, the very balloon sent to us from 
England is khaki-coloured. It was painted so, but it 
would have soon turned so if it had been let alone. 
We wash and dress, and go out to breakfast. Between 
us and the mess-table is the kitchen. The ladies at 
home should see that kitchen of the officers' mess of 
the Yorkshire Light Infantry, which has turned out 
soup that Lord Methuen has praised, and viands we 
have not been a bit ashamed to offer to him and his 
brigadiers. 

This serviceable kitchen consists of a sort of bonfire, 
around and on top of which are set half a dozen Flan- 
ders kettles — oval black pots about a foot high, and 



CHRISTMAS WITH METHUEN'S ARMY 207 

eight or nine inches wide in the middle. In one of 
these porridge is cooking, in another tea, in others 
coffee, milk, bloaters, and the like. Soldiers in their 
shirt-sleeves are chopping wood, stirring the pots, fry- 
ing the bacon, and serving out the food to the servants. 
The mess-sergeant's tent is near by — a little provision 
shop, in and before which are boxes and chests of bis- 
cuits, cake, tinned goods of almost every sort, sauces, 
beer, spirits, bread, and other edibles — milk and butter 
being wholly missing. 

Already the intense heat of the day is on everything, 
and yet, because we are among soldiers, every man 
wears his coat, and wears it buttoned to the chin. The 
officers are all used to buttoned-up suffocation, and 
deserve no credit ; but every morning I pat myself on 
the back, and declare that it is almost as courageous 
for me to put my coat on my fevered, sweltering body, 
and then button it up, as it is for a professional warrior 
to go into battle. 

A dozen or so of the ofificers are round their rude 
mess-table, each with his soldier-servant behind him, 
or passing between the kitchen and the table. 

" Merry Christmas ! " Merry Christmas ! " comes 
from every throat, and heartily is the greeting shouted 
back. I look at them all and wonder how they ap- 
peared in London, or in Yorkshire, when last they were 
at home. Certainly not as they appeared now in their 
old and stained khaki, with here and there a beard or 



2o8 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

a blistered nose, and everywhere hands and faces tanned 
and tinted like mahogany. 

How modest and unassuming, how frank and broth- 
erly they are, these sterling fellows who have been 
in the heat of four battles, have been thinned in mess 
and ranks by shocking losses, and yet are as eager for 
the next fray as the newest regiment out here. I know 
no other regiment so well, for I have lived with this 
since Methuen's start ; but I suppose these men are 
simply types of British officers. I know that never a 
man in our mess has grumbled or complained. I have 
seen the unvarying eagerness with which each man has 
heard that a battle was on for next day. After 
any engagement each has told of his part in it as calmly 
as an architect would tell of a day's work in an office. 

But wonderful as these men seem to me, they are 
but British officers. And In an army made up of the 
best regiments there must be many a mess like this. 

The talk is of the big plum-pudding that has been 
sent up from Capetown for the officers. The Queen's 
chocolate for the men has not yet come, and makeshift 
puddings are to be made in camp. 

There will be champagne at the officers' dinner, and 
a tot of spirits is to be served to every Tommy. 
Frankly, we find it a little difficult to talk of Christmas, 
with nothing to remind us of it except a promise of 
pudding, and a distant view of a white-robed clergyman 
talking to a double line of soldiers on the veldt. 



CHRISTMAS WITH METHUEN'S ARMY 209 

Breakfast over, most of us linger at the table. Under 
it at one end is a packing-case filled with newspapers 
and pictorial weeklies. 

A subaltern shouts aloud with joy, as he stirs up the 
collection and brings to view an Illustrated Mail that 
he had not seen before. The rest of us look for papers 
we have not seen, but no such luck is to come to any 
of us, and so we fall to with our tongues. 

*' Shop " is almost our only theme. Sometimes we 
get well on with a conversation of other sorts, but in- 
variably a new-comer drops in and says that our bal- 
loon is being sent up, or the new 4*7 gun has come, 
and — off we go upon the war. To-day, for a change, 
we get up an uncommon strong interest in a new sub- 
ject — sports for New Year's Day. That I take it is a 
topic that never fell flat in a British company. 

The work of the regiment goes on during Christmas 
as on every other day. The pickets go out, relieving 
those who are to come in. The men are taken to 
bathe in the river, even a detachment is sent to help 
the Engineers in building a trench. 

Some of us, who are not Tommies, go for a ride 
with the colonel, or stroll over to hear the best of the 
Scotch pipers play, or if we read a novel, or write a 
letter, these things only show that in solemn truth all 
there is to be of Christmas is the dinner — and our 
thoughts of home. 
. Suddenly there is a tremendous cheering, like that 



2IO TOWARDS PRETORIA 

of the Israelites of old shouting some city's walls to 
ruins, like what there is to be when the Boers and 
British come to the end of this argument. I rush from 
my tent to see all the regiment drawn up before its 
camp — and all the Black Watch before their camp — 
and all the Argylls across the railway drawn up in bat- 
talion formation in front of their tents — and all cheer- 
ing. 

Why, every man there in khaki is out and cheering. 
'* What's it all about ? " I ask. " They're cheering the 
Queen " — a beautiful annual custom of which I confess 
I'd never heard. Her Majesty's greeting arrives on 
the moment, and when it has been read it is cheered 
with yet another mighty ringing roar. 

And so we come to lunch in our windy, dusty, and 
hot rendezvous, and pleasantry and good spirits flow 
among us, for we have all been thrilled by that out- 
burst of cheers. 

" Ah, here is the general now," says Colonel Barter, 
and leaves us to go out upon the veldt and welcome 
Pole-Carew and his aide, smartly dressed, alert, soldierly 
in face and bearing, glance and speech. He has come 
to visit each company at dinner, and give the season's 
greeting to the men. He goes down the line to the 
end tent of each row, where the sergeants are eating. 
He looks into each tent door, and says he hopes they 
are having a good dinner, and he wishes them a merry 
Christmas. He varies the words from place to place, 



CHRISTMAS WITH METHUEN'S ARMY 211 

but never the sentiment. He hears there is pudding, 
and it is shown to him. He says he is sorry the Royal 
chocolate did not come, and that he regrets there is 
no beer to be had. Always the men struggle to rise, 
and each time he says, " No, please sit still," or " Don't 
get up." 

This kindly ceremony over, there is only dinner to 
look forward to. If it does not blow or rain we know 
that all is certain to go well. The elements prove 
kindly, the pudding is perfect, the coffee and Benedic- 
tine taste like nectar, and all are now so cheery and 
near to the Christmas spirit that it is an hour later 
than usual when the little band of brother braves 
scatters in the darkness and the desert dirt. 



CHAPTER XXIII 

TRAITS OF MODERN BATTLE 

War has as many faces and phases as Dame Fortune 
herself. For weeks we of Lord Methuen's force were 
aptly described as a flying column — a flying and fight- 
ing column we were, leaping northward, and dealing 
blows right and left as we coursed. 

We were not sure of our meals in those days ; in 
fact, we were more nearly certain of not getting them. 
We came to a pause after the fight on the Modder, 
but the fever was still on us, and presently ** up and at 
them " was the cry, and we fought the biggest battle 
of all four at Magersfontein. 

After that the wind went out of our sails, and we 
waited for a new supply of men and munitions. We 
seemed to have leased this little watering-place from 
the Kimberley folk, whose holiday or health retreat it 
used to be. 

If we used cards in the army we would have had new 
ones printed with this address. We made ourselves 
at home here. A market had been established for us, 
and we had fresh eggs and genuine milk, new vege- 

212 



TRAITS OF MODERN BATTLE 213 

tables and butter, to say nothing of formal dinners to 
our generals and our friends from other messes. Books 
came into camp, and we read and lent them around. 

Our horses were used only for afternoon rides, and 
there were even men among us who fished at times in 
the river — which in other respects had become a 
laundry and a horse trough, where the foot soldiers 
washed their khaki, and the troopers watered their 
steeds. 

I would not risk giving any one the idea that we 
were idle. I believe time was that soldiers lounged 
and dawdled a great deal — hence the term " sojering " 
applied to a lazy mechanic who avoids hard work. 
But those were not even nineteenth-century soldiers, 
and here we were within hail of the twentieth century. 
No, we truly thought that we were having an easy 
time, but the term was merely comparative. Tommy 
had to take his turn at picket duty — one night in four 
— at trench digging, at scouting, or patrol work if he 
is a mounted man. He had to cook and wash, and 
undergo inspection, and be up at daybreak, and look 
after his rifle and accoutrements. Other hundreds of 
men kept Army Service stores, and dealt out forage 
and rations, clothes, boots, putties ; and did black- 
smithing, horse-shoeing, harness-mending, carpentering 
and I know not what all ; while the engineers built 
trenches and bridges, mended culverts and the railway 
road-bed, and put in order the tanks and windmills 



214 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

that got comminuted fractures in the last great battle. 
In all the world there are not many trades as active 
and laborious as this same *' soldiering," which once 
bore such a poor nickname. 

The queer thing about us was that we were making 
ourselves believe that we were at rest; and our sur- 
roundings helped to strengthen the delusion. For our 
surroundings formed a complete picture of peace ; they 
symbolised calm and leisure ; they wore a Sabbath 
air of village restfulness. 

The men who report for the Daily Mail, the Times^ 
Renter' s, the Morning Post, Black and White, and one 
or two other publications, moved their mule trunks 
into a queer little mud-walled hotel on the " island," 
where the Modder marries the Riet. 

This is considered, I was told, the Bournemouth of 
Kimberley, and in other years the riverside trees have 
sheltered many tents and camps of summer loiterers 
from the diamond fields, while the Kimberley belles 
and beaux have haunted the darker corners of my 
stoep at night, and the music of violin and piano and 
of dancing boots has tickled the air of the dining-room, 
while the soberer men have studied colored cards and 
jingled coins at tables in the bedrooms. I am afraid 
these folk would not know the place this year any 
more than I can imagine it as they have known it. A 
shrapnel shell burst in the dining-room, another venti- 
lated the bedroom of the Times, and a third has made 



TRAITS OF MODERN BATTLE 215 

a new window in the wall of Number 5. All the walls 
are rendered like the tops of so many pepper-pots by 
Mauser bullets, and in a storm it always rains harder 
in the hotel than outside. 

However, stand with me on my stoep. The 
green trees of the riverside are bathed in sunshine, and 
trembling in a soft breeze. They are so small that 
we can look over them to the other trees around 
the store, the station, and the Crown, and Royal Hotel. 
The veldt lies at one side, and far away are many lines 
of tents, which ought, perhaps, to suggest war, but 
yet manage to increase the note of rest and order, 
quiet and calm, which sweetly pervades everything else. 

The farthest object is a ganger's hut on the railway 
to the left, and then the view closes with a soft, rolling, 
purple line of hills. The level, yellow veldt, the vil- 
lage among the trees, the brilliant blue sky, with white 
clouds lazily afloat beneath it and the smooth undu- 
lating bluish hills, how perfect a scene of peace these 
make. 

Now saddle up two horses and ride with me to the 
ganger's hut. Why, hello ! there's a huge khaki- 
coloured cannon the shape of a hock bottle ? And a 
lot of men in strange, broad-brimmed hats are standing 
near it. They are men of the Naval Brigade, and the 
gun is a 4*7 from the Doris. 

" Did you ever see any Boers ? " an officer calls out 
to us. 



2i6 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

"Very few," say I; "just the prisoners we have 
taken " — for we are fighting an invisible foe, as every 
one knows by this time. 

" Well, have a look through this." He taps the 
gun's telescope as he speaks, and we look through it. 

" Heavens ! are those Boers ? " We see them all 
over the hills in numbers, like plant-lice on a leaf. 
They are all over the hills — riding, walking, sitting in 
groups, looking over redoubts, digging trenches, pass- 
ing water up the slope — the little range of purple 
breasts is alive with busy Boers. 

Then we must have been mistaken about the peace- 
fulness of this place. Peace where all those Boers are ! 
There has been no peace in Africa since the Boers 
came here ; no peace for the British since they became 
the Boers' neighbours. 

We are to lunch with the Guards, and we shall be 
late if we do not hurry. Ah, here's their mess tent, 
and they have begun to eat. Welcomed, and places 
made for us, we seat ourselves and are served with 
soup. Boom ! soof — soof — soof — soof — soof — soof — 
ooogh ! The boom is the noise of a big gun, the soof 
— soof is the shell tearing through the air ; the ooogh 
— precisely like a cough — is the bursting of the shell. 

" That's our Joey," says the colonel ; " let us see 
where the shell strikes? By Jove! a pretty shot — 
plumb where they have their 40-pounder ! " 

" Boom ! " from the Boer gun on the right ; " Ugh ! " 



TRAITS OF MODERN BATTLE 217 

from its shell, which sends up a fountain spray of sand 
near the ganger's hut. 

" Didn't burst," says a captain. 

" Devilish good range, though ! " says another. And 
now we are all out of the tent, sending for glasses, 
forgetting our lunch, intent upon this gigantic duel. 

How frequently did this happen ? How often was 
this vale of pastoral peace startled by such sounds and 
ferment ? Oh, as a rule, every morning with a shot or 
two ; every afternoon with from half an hour to two 
hours* firing, and then again at odd and unexpected 
hours on odd and unlooked-for days. We shook the 
Boers up at eleven o'clock the other night. We had 
set our big guns by daylight to hit their best positions, 
and a battery of 12-pounders to rake their trenches. 

Then, suddenly, when it was near midnight, we let 
fly. Our 12-pounders sent a hail of shrapnel shot into 
their trenches, and they imagined that our infantry 
were shooting, so a mile or two of men in their trenches 
opened fire on the black night, and satisfied us of their 
state of nervousness. I say satisfied us, because on 
the previous night they had loosed a mile or two of 
rifles far on our right for no reason that we could dis- 
cover, though an ingenious theorist in camp holds that 
a mule must have strayed up against the barbed-wire 
strung along before their trenches. 

We had merely exchanged a round or two of civili- 
ties with our neighbours, and flattered ourselves that 



2i8 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

this would suffice for the day, for, as a rule, these things 
are left to us, and it is we who make the welkin ring. 
An hour or two later one hundred and fifty Reservists 
came to join the Yorkshire Light Infantry, and were 
paraded well forward on the veldt, to be seen and 
addressed by the Brigadier-General. They were spread 
along in a lengthy double line, and the Boers must 
have thought them threatening, for bang ! came a solid 
shell into the veldt five hundred yards before them. 
It was comical then to note how the older men, experi- 
enced in this war, aired their experience before the 
new-comers. 

" That's nothing," they said ; " mustn't think any- 
thing of that. We have that every hour or two. 
You'll soon get used to it. We have it at night, too ; 
but you mustn't get jumpy when the shells come rat- 
tling among the tents, because, really, there's no harm 
at all in them Boer shells." 

In this way we alternately revelled in peace and in 
war — going out a few miles and destroying some farm- 
houses which were proven nests of sniping Boers, or 
watching a Boer patrol which rode interestingly near 
one of our naval guns. Now it was at daybreak that 
we sent them our compliments, and next we were 
" boomed " out of bed and forced to dress twice in an 
hour at midnight, as we heard the roar of great guns 
and the crackle of artillery. On Christmas alone, of 
all the days since we took to the field, we enjoyed a 
full day of uninterrupted peace. 



CHAPTER XXIV 

SCENES AND SOUNDS OF MODERN WAR 

The pictures of our battles which are produced in 
illustrated papers are not at all like real scenes at the 
front. 

Art cannot keep pace with the quick advances of 
science, and illustrators find that for effect they must 
still put as much smoke and confusion in their battle 
studies as went with the old pictures of Waterloo. If 
this were left out the public would be disappointed, 
and unable to tell a battle-field from a parade. 

Lately a picture in one of our leading papers, by a 

very capable artist, showed the British storming a 

Boer position. In the middle distance was a Boer 

battery, and the only gunner left alive was standing 

up with a bandage round his head, while smoke and 

flame and flying fragments of shells filled the air in 

his vicinity. In the rush of the instant he must have 

been bandaged by the same shot that struck him, and 

as for the smoke and flying debris, there was more of 

this in a corner of that picture than was to be seen in 

all the four battles we have fought ! 

219 



220 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

What then is a modern battle — how does it look and 
sound ? 

Really, the field of operations is so extensive, and 
the range of modern guns is so great, that fighting 
conditions have altered, until there is no longer any 
general " noise of battle hurtled in the air," no possi- 
bility of grasping or viewing an engagement from any 
single point. 

You may hear one of our big guns loosed three 
miles over on the right, and another two miles on the 
left. If you are near they make a tremendous noise, 
yet I have not heard any explosion so loud as a good 
strong clap of thunder. The guns of the enemy cough 
far in front of you, and their shells burst within your 
lines with a louder sound — but with no real crash or 
deafening roar. 

Our guns at their muzzles create but little smoke, 
though our lyddite shells throw up clouds of dust and 
smoke where they fall miles away. Because the Boers 
are using old-fashioned powder in their cannon there 
is a small white cloud wherever one is fired, and a 
spurt of red sand where their shells dig into the veldt. 
The smoke of war, therefore, and the so-called roar of 
battle are now-a-days occasional, scattered, inconsider- 
able. 

Rifle-firing has been the principal feature of our 
fights. It sounds like the frying of fat, or like the 
crackling and snapping of green wood in a bonfire. If 



SCENES OF MODERN WAR 221 

you are within two miles of the front you are apt to 
be under fire, and then you hear the music of individ- 
ual bullets. Their song is like the magnified note of 
a mosquito. " Z — z — z — z — z " they go over your 
head ; " z — z — z — z — p " they finish as they bury them- 
selves in the ground. This is a sound only to be heard 
when the bullets fly very close. You pick up your 
heels and run a hundred, or even fifty, yards, and you 
hear nothing but the general crackle of rifle-fire in 
and before the trenches. 

The "putt-putt," or Vickers-Nordenfeldt gun, is 
able to interest you at a distance of three miles. Its 
explosions are best described by the nickname given 
to the gun by one regiment : " the blooming door- 
knocker." Its bullets or shells are as big as the bowl 
of a large briar-root pipe, and they tear and slit the 
air with a terrible sound, exploding when they strike. 
The firing of this gun was heard all over the largest of 
our battle-fields, and the sound of exploding shells car- 
ried far, because they were apt to fall on the quiet, 
outer edge of the field. The whizz that even these 
missiles make in flying, however, is, like the whispered 
answers of a maid in love, only to be heard by the 
favoured individual who is especially addressed. 

Thus the many separate sounds are not loud enough 
to blend. The crowning, all-pervading noises are 
those of the guns and of the rifle-fire, and on the vast 
veldt, spread over a double line of five to seven 



222 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

miles in length, only those that are very near are very 
loud. 

The scene of battle — the general view — is exceed- 
ingly orderly. There may be a desperate scrimmage 
where a company or two are storming a kopje, but 
level your glass on yonder hill, and what do you see — 
a fringe of tiny jets of fire from the top where the 
Boers are, and our men in khaki rising, and reclining, 
and occasionally firing, as they win their way upward. 

The general view displays an arrangement as meth- 
odical as a chess-board. There are several battalions 
flat on their faces in two or three long lines. Over 
here is a battery in perfect order, with its limber of 
horses at rest near by. Another battery, equally well 
arranged, as if to have its photograph taken, is to be 
seen in the middle field ; a third is on the farther side. 
The cavalry is sweeping across the veldt in perfect 
rank and alignment. There is no confusion anywhere 
— nothing is helter-skelter or slap-dash. 

I remember only two momentary disturbances of 
this stern steady discipline. One was in the after- 
noon, during the Modder River fight, when a large 
band of mounted Boers made a flank movement on 
our extreme right, and fired a volley at our immense 
mass of transport and ambulance waggons, water-carts, 
and ammunition trains. 

The drivers were taken by surprise, and fell to lash- 
ing their mule teams and horses, generally to the 



SCENES OF MODERN WAR 223 

accompaniment of high-keyed Kaffir yells. The rout 
lasted but five minutes or less, and was comical beyond 
description, because the leading mules climbed over 
the wheelers, and the faster the bullets fell the louder 
the Kaffirs yelled, and the more they plied their 
enormous whips. 

The bravery of our stretcher-bearers is as much 
beyond question as it is beyond praise. All historians 
who tell of the dash and valour of the generals, colonels, 
majors, captains, and " Tommies " of the army, in 
common justice must also describe how the chaplains, 
doctors, and stretcher-bearers went in and out of the 
most hellish fire, not once or twice, but all through 
every battle. 

It is just outside the range of fire that you see and 
realise the horrors of war. It is there that the wounded 
crawl and stagger by you ; it is there that they spend 
their final output of energy, and fall down to lie until 
♦ assistance comes ; it is there that you see stretchers 
laden with their mangled freight, and sound soldiers 
bearing the wounded on their backs and in their arms. 

More certainly to know the brutality and woe of 
war, happen upon a kopje that has just been stormed, 
or a trench that has been carried. Go to such a place 
to-day, twenty centuries after Christ came with His 
message of peace on earth, and good-will to men, and 
behold what you shall see. 

" Here," said I to a photographer in such a place — 



224 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

I think it was Belmont — " snap this scene. Look at 
the wounded all over the ground. Quick ! out with 
your camera." 

'' Oh, I can't," said he ; *' it's too horrible ! " 

'' As you please," I said, '' but it's what the public 
wants." 

You read, in the writings of those who know nothing 
of war, about the writhing of the wounded, and the 
groaning on the battle-field. There is no writhing, 
and the groans are few and faint. There was one man 
who was simply cut to pieces by a shell at Maaghers- 
fontein, and his sufferings must have been awful. He 
kept crying, ''Doctor, can't you do anything?" 
Another begged to be killed, and the first wounded 
man I saw kept saying, poor fellow, in ever so low a 
voice, " Oh, dear, dear, dear ! Oh, dear, dear, dear ! " 
But there is much less groaning than you would im- 
agine — very little in proportion to the sufferings. 

Two things are so common with the wounded as to 
be almost like rules of behaviour. They all beg for 
water (it used to be cigarettes that they asked for on 
the Turkish side in the last war in Europe), and they 
seem always to be made gentle by their wounds. Men 
of the roughest speech, profane by second nature, 
cease to offend when stricken down. 

" Well, mate," said one, whose leg was shattered, 
"you never know when your turn will come, do 
you ? " 



SCENES OF MODERN WAR 225 

And another simply cried, " Oh, dear ! " 

Now and then you heard, " For God's sake get me 
taken to an ambulance," but no profanity was intended 
there. 

Many may wonder how it feels to be wounded. All 
who had bones shattered by expanding bullets used 
nearly the same language to describe the sensation. 

" You feel," they said, " exactly as if you had 
received a powerful shock from an electric battery, 
and then comes a blow as if your foot " (or arm, or 
whatever part it might be) '' was crushed by a stroke 
with a tremendous mallet." It is much the same in a 
lesser degree if a bone is struck by a Mauser bullet ; 
but if the smooth, slender, clean little shot merely 
pierces the flesh, a burning or stinging sensation is the 
instantaneous result. 

" Lying six hours in the broiling sun was pretty 
bad," said one whose arm-bone was smashed ; " but 
the really awful experience was the jolting over rocks 
when I was carried off in an ambulance." 

Another man, an ofificer, whose foot was smashed 
by an explosive bullet, said, " Look at my pipe. 
That's what I did to keep from saying anything." He 
had bitten off an inch of the hardened rubber mouth- 
piece. That was before his wound was dressed. The 
relief that is given by the dressing of a wound must 
be exquisite, for you hear next to no groans or moans 
after a doctor has given this first attention. 
IS 



326 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

In the army of Lord Methuen the great majority of 
wounds were in the arms and feet ; but other points 
and experiences in war are more remarkable. The 
chances of receiving a wound seem not to have 
greatly increased with the improvements in modern 
death-dealing implements. There were more than a 
million shots fired at Modder River, an4 yet only 
about eight hundred men were hit, while the number 
of bullets that hit water-bottles, haversacks, ration- 
tins, and coat-sleeves was astonishing. The damage 
to life and limb by the excessive artillery fire was next 
to nothing. 

On a typical field of battle the armies oppose one 
another with orderly masses. Staff officers ride hither 
and thither. Batteries rumble to and fro at long in- 
tervals as they are ordered to take new positions, and 
in the same way the cavalry appear and reappear on 
the edges of the field. Stretcher-bearers bring the 
wounded out of the zone of danger, and ambulances 
roll up, get their loads, and roll away again, all day 
continually, as in a ceaseless train. 

Brave privates bring out the wounded, and work 
their way back into fire again, now running forward, 
now dropping flat upon the veldt. Skulkers work 
back to the edge of the field in the same way — a few 
only — and are gathered up and sent forward in batches 
by the officers who come upon them. At last the 
cheer of British victory is heard, and the whole force 



SCENES OF MODERN WAR 227 

rushes forward ; or darkness falls upon an unfinished 
fight, and we grope about the veldt seeking our camps, 
and the food and drink that most of us have gone 
without too long. 



CHAPTER XXV 

A HALT IN MODERN WAR METHODS 

On January 20th Lord Methuen's force was not 
resting, but busy enough, though not fighting. 

When we all come to be judged by the work we 
have done in these early days of the war, it shall not 
be said that in the time we took to fight four battles, 
and in the severity of those engagements, we did not 
do as much as could be expected of everyday fighting 
men. 

A fickle public may have turned aside from us, fas- 
tening its passing interest on a Buller or a French, and 
saying, " It is to these new favourites that we must 
look for our excitement." But when we were filling 
the stage, what a brilliant spectacle we made ! What 
dash we showed ! What swiftness marked our prog- 
ress ! What sturdy blows we dealt, and how quickly 
we showered them down ! 

We were not checked ! It was the methods of 
modern warfare that halted ! ^ 

It had not fallen to any other general's lot to meet 

with a foe so situated as to embody the entire strength, 
228 



A HALT IN MODERN WAR METHODS 229 

under fullest conditions, of the newest methods of 
defence. 

It was easy enough for the world to cry " Halt ! " in 
its interest in us, just as the Boers cried " Halt ! " in 
our progress when we reached Maaghersfontein, but 
the Boer command to us to halt must also be consid- 
ered by military scientists everywhere as an order 
given to all armed nations to stop and unlearn much 
that they have known of war — for Maaghersfontein 
seems likely to be the end of the fighting system that 
was practised by the Wellingtons, Wolseleys, Von 
Moltkes, and Grants of bygone days. 

Look at Maaghersfontein. It is a grass and bush- 
strewn plain, not perfectly level, but indented by a few 
slight ridges. Had Lord Methuen advanced upon it 
as quickly from the Modder River fight as he rushed 
from one to the other of his preceding battles, he 
might not have been checked, because the strength 
of their defence was wrought in the time he gave the 
Boers in which to build fresh trenches, and to recover 
from their rout. 

He might thus have gained another victory, but 
this would only have postponed that revelation of the 
strength of modern weapons, which must, in any event, 
have soon startled the world. He had fought three 
battles in a week. He might have fought a fourth. 
Then his men must have rested, and he would have 
met his check at Spytfontein. 



230 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

Somewhere, very soon, the Boers would have shown 
him what they demonstrated at Maaghersfontein, 
proving that, given a plain field of grass, modern 
magazine rifles, and quick-firing small guns, the whole 
German army itself could not dislodge the sixty-five 
thousand men of the two Boer republics. 

It was not that there were many Boers or many 
British in this battle. Of the Boers there were twelve 
to fifteen thousand ; of the British eight or nine thou- 
sand at a full estimate. But it is certain that by a 
frontal attack on those grass-edged trenches not fifty 
thousand British could have beaten the fifteen thou- 
sand Boers, except at such a sacrifice of life as no 
commander would require, or could be pardoned for 
occasioning. 

The question of the wisdom or unwisdom of pursu- 
ing the method of frontal attack, which had served 
Lord Methuen with success up to this point, is not a 
matter to be discussed in these descriptive pages. 

For frontal attack the old military manuals declared 
that the attacking force must outnumber the defenders 
by three to one. To-day, with the new weapons, it is 
said that ten men must attack one, but it is impossible 
to set the modern proportion correctly, since, to all 
intents and purposes, Maaghersfontein battle-field, with 
its threefold trenches extending twenty-five miles, was 
as impregnable to infantry as Cronstadt is to attack 
by torpedo boats. 



A HALT IN MODERN WAR METHODS 231 

It has been beyond question proved that many 
changes must be made in coming warfare to suit the 
new conditions by which we are confronted. Even as 
the Boers have shown that they have been learning 
how best to utilise their advantages, since the war 
began, so we are gaining knowledge, and certainly have 
yet a great deal to acquire. 

The Boer as a stalker of game, and later, as a warrior, 
had made the fullest use of the natural advantages of 
a country whose defences are everywhere abundant. 
Of these he took the kopjes and their rocks to be the 
best, but at Belmont and Graspan he discovered that 
the reckless, seemingly blind, valour of our men made 
light of these, simply by making light of death. 

The Boer, therefore, modified his methods, and 
adopted the shelter of intrenchments. 

At Modder River he built his trenches at the edge 
of a steep river-bed, which afforded him cover for the 
movement of reinforcements, and the supplying of 
ammunition, food, and water to his forces. At Maa- 
ghersfontein he built a threefold series of trenches, and 
made the centre of his position a kopje whose foot was 
fringed by vaal bushes, behind which he could move 
his reinforcements, carry off his dead and wounded, and 
distribute his food, and fresh supplies of cartridges. 

With the old-style single-shot rifle the change from 
behind the rocks of his hills to the protection afforded 
by mere ridges, or hastily built trenches, would have 



232 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

made him an easy prey to the bravest troops in Europe, 
such as we believe to have been in Lord Methuen's 
following. 

But with magazine rifles, artillery, and such fearful, 
terrifying weapons as the new Vickers-Nordenfeldt 
gun, he could make a ridge or trench impregnable. 

One of the most interesting and formidable of the 
new conditions of war which we have experienced is 
that we so seldom see our foe. Can the keenest 
student of war comprehend what it means to go on 
week after week, and month after month, fighting an 
invisible enemy ? 

A few Boers were to be seen bolting before us at 
Belmont, a smaller number escaping from the punish- 
ment we were meting out to them at Graspan, and 
several hundred showing themselves — with uncommon 
impudence and courage — before the beginning of the 
battle at Modder River ; but there were at this time 
men in our army who had never seen a Boer in battle ; 
there were even ofificers who had only seen one or two 
in one battle, and five or six in another. In engage- 
ment after engagement our men have thrown them- 
selves upon the veldt, moved to do so by a hail of 
bullets around them, and then have fired away for 
hours at a time, aiming at the noise or the flame of 
the enemy's fire in trenches which they could not see. 

This is true to such an extent, that at Modder 
River there were whole battalions of ours that did not 



A HALT IN MODERN WAR METHODS 233 

know at the end of the day whether the enemy was 
north or south of the river ; in fact, they believed, 
during the entire battle, that the enemy was on the 
farther side of it. Under such circumstances, if we did 
not pick up some wounded and take some prisoners, as 
actual ocular proof of the existence of a flesh-and-blood 
enemy, we might almost have expected the more im- 
aginative of our soldiers to believe that they had been 
fighting a phantom host. 

They had seen the earth crack apart, and vomit flame 
and bullets ; they had heard the hell's chorus of battle ; 
they had seen their comrades fall dead and mangled 
by their sides ; but they had not seen the men who 
produced the tumult and the damage. This, then, is 
among the new conditions of war which have to be 
taken into account. 

With the introduction of smokeless powder a foe 
intrenched, or hiding behind rocks, is a foe invisible ; 
and it takes a tenfold stouter heart to fight an unseen 
enemy, than to join issue with a substantial line of 
flesh-and-blood, or to reply to a leaping, running target 
of brown smoke which locates, if it does not reveal, the 
danger with which men have to deal. 

In a way, then, and to a certain degree — if we may 
say so of such an experienced soldier — Lord Methuen 
had to grope his way through, against, and around 
these new conditions, and, in common with our other 
generals, to face new problems and fresh devices that 



234 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

have sprung from the first rivalry of men equally well 
armed with the latest implements of war. 

It is easier to sit at home and denounce our tactics, 
than to understand the new light thrown upon warfare 
by the adoption of smokeless powder, and the terrible, 
staggering surprises brought about by weapons that 
can kill at a farther range than two miles, and can stop 
ten men with one magazine full of shot. 

We of the British side have placed great reliance 
upon our artillery, and especially upon that branch of 
it which wields the deadly gas and murderous shock 
of lyddite. It may be that our successes thus far have 
been due to the fact that ours are the best artillerists 
in the world, and that we have had the use of lyddite 
to ourselves ; but we shall only know all the truth when 
the war ends, or when we come with a rush upon some 
battle-field which we have pelted with shells for hours. 

In South Africa the local reporters have told us re- 
peatedly of the fearful slaughter our shells have caused, 
of how our gunners " saw 400 Boers, fired, and then 
saw not a soul ; " but we must take these reports with 
more than a grain of salt. We have been under artil- 
lery fire sometimes for hours — and it has been well- 
directed fire. It has done us but little damage, and 
therefore we may naturally ask why that which we have 
shot at the enemy should be thought to have done so 
very much more execution ? 

While admitting the familiar truth that artillery fire 



A HALT IN MODERN WAR METHODS 235 

is terrifying, those who have themselves out-lived the 
terror may well wonder whether this may not also be 
true of the Boers, and, wondering, wait for revelation 
of the facts. 

We do know that a European army, fighting under 
European rules, is a clumsy weapon against the Boer, 
who opposes us with weapons which render one 
man as good as ten, and all ten invisible. We remem- 
ber the old saying, that " an army moves upon its 
belly," and we paraphrase this and make it read " the 
modern army must fight upon its belly." 

We have learned that even British valour, displayed 
by a number of men equal to the foe, is of no con- 
clusive value under the new conditions, and that if all 
modern armies could intrench themselves, and could 
then compel their enemies to meet them in frontal 
attack, war would soon be abandoned as impossible. 



CHAPTER XXVI 

CORRESPONDENTS UNDER FIRE 

He had reported only one battle before this, and 
he had gone into it gaily, with a journalist's longing 
for a new sensation ; but something now happened 
that was not in his programme. 

While running down the railway embankment he 
had all but stumbled over a dead man with one 
shoulder and breast torn away. 

Fascinated, he turned to look, and saw that it was 
the body of a splendid fellow who had sat next to 
him at mess the night before — an officer of the Grena- 
dier Guards. The unclosed eyes were looking at him. 
They seemed to follow him as he turned away, sick 
at stomach and at heart. 

Sick at stomach and at heart, he stumbled ahead 

over the rocks and furrows of the veldt, tugging at 

the reins of his horse, which persisted in trying to 

graze, as horses always do, even where bullets are 

whistling and shells are bursting — as horses will do 

even while their riders are swaying in the saddle, shot 

through heart or head. He cursed the glutton for its 
236 



CORRESPONDENTS UNDER FIRE 237 

lack of sentiment, and when its nose went down again 
for another nibble in the sage bush, he lashed its face 
with the loose end of the lines. 

After that there was another war on the veldt — a 
tussel with his horse — a war within a war. 

He was trying to hurry to a small, round, rocky 
kopje, against which he had seen a regiment in khaki 
fling itself English fashion, headlong, blunt, straight 
from the shoulder. 

His horse was still trying to graze, and must be 
either ridden or turned loose. As this was at too 
close quarters for him to make himself a target on 
horseback, he let it go, and ran for the men in khaki, 
and the crackle of their rifle-fire, which was answered 
and echoed by the continuous fire of the grimy and 
unkempt Boers from behind the towering rocks, and 
when he reached the last line of British, stooping like 
stalkers after deer, he found himself in a down-pour 
of shot. 

The bullets sang all around him, like darting, angry 
bees disturbed. 

They sang over his head, they whizzed over his 
shoulders beside both ears, they zizzed by his waist, 
and they buzzed between his legs ; for there is no 
place where the superfluous bullets do not go ; and 
thank God ! nine hundred and ninety-nine in every 
thousand are superfluous. 

Yes, they even buzzed between his legs, and he fell 



23S TOWARDS PRETORIA 

flat on his face, and said to himself that he did not 
get salary enough for such an experience, and that 
the war correspondent who exposed himself to fire 
was recreant to his duty, and an idiot to boot. He 
lay flat on his face, and lo ! the firing ceased. There 
was only now and then a shot, and here and there a 
reply, and he looked up and saw the men in khaki, 
silhouetted against the shiny black rocks, all boldly 
upright, and rushing up the hill. They had driven 
the unwashed, unshaven enemy out of those rocky 
nests, and the day was won. The day was won, and 
all was well, except that he, a war correspondent, had 
run needless risks. 

And now another day had come, and another battle 
was on. Another battle was on, and to be in it and 
safe at the same time he was with the battery of naval 
guns. Though it is not at all true, any one who has 
never been through a war will tell you that you are 
safe in battle if you are with the guns. He was a 
handsome young fellow, and has since proved himself 
brave to the marrow ; but with bravery he unites 
common-sense, and he said to himself : " I can't write 
if I'm killed or wounded. I'm paid for keeping safe." 
So he and another correspondent were with the naval 
men in their broad-rimmed straw hats covered with 
khaki, with their loose, slouching attitudes and move- 
ments — so different from the trim and style of soldiers, 
without being any the worse for the difference. 



CORRESPONDENTS UNDER FIRE 239 

When the gunners saw anything at which to fire 
they were busy for a minute or two, but between 
whiles they lounged about as though at a picnic. 
The officers smoked cigarettes and talked of last night's 
" sing-song," humming over again some of the " catch- 
ing " choruses they had heard. The men squatted on 
the veldt with their backs against their gun carriages, 
as sturdy chickens nuzzle up against a mother hen. 
They fired when they saw some Boers a-horseback, or 
heard a long fusillade from an unseen trench. No- 
body answered them. It was one-sided warfare such 
as an onlooker, paid for keeping safe, could enjoy. 

It was one-sided warfare, till the Boers got one of 
their batteries into position behind a ridge a mile and 
a-half away. Then it became two-sided, like a game 
of battledore and shuttle-cock, in which it seemed 
that every time we sent them a shell they sent it back. 
A Royal Artillery battery rumbled up and unlimbered 
near us, sending its horses a little to the rear, and 
instantly opening heavy fire on the foe. 

Opening heavy fire — and meeting heavy fire. Z-z- 
z-o-oo-woof! came the shells, ripping the air, gash- 
ing the ground, and throwing up fountains of red earth 
and broken iron. The correspondents, and one or 
two officers who appeared to have no part in the work 
of the battery stood near a railway culvert, of solid 
masonry, and strolled into its shelter every time they 
saw the flash and smoke of a Boer gun. It may not 



240 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

have been very brave, but they had no call to be brave 
just then. 

" Courage is not a thing to brandish about like a 
horse pistol in the hands of a madman/' the corre- 
spondent thought, " it's like good liquor, to be barrelled, 
and tapped when called for." 

They continued to stroll into the culvert at every 
flash of a Boer gun, until they saw that the Boers shot 
wide, all of them, and every time. Then they turned 
their backs upon the culvert, and strolled about, pooh- 
poohing the enemy's shells. 

" Hello ! there goes that gun. That's going wide 
of the R. A. limber. Hi ! there goes the chap who is 
shooting at us. Let's see if he gets any nearer than 
the next county. Look ! there goes the Johnny who's 
after that bunch of transport waggons. By Jove ! 
see how they scamper ! Hanged if he didn't chuck 
dust all over that near buck- waggon ! " 

In this way the idlers chronicled every shot that was 
addressed to us by the enemy, until — until z-z-z-oo- 
wuf, went a shell into the R.A. limber, and two horses 
fell, one minus a jaw, and the other with its stomach 
torn out. Somebody began the remark '' that Johnny 
has got the range," when, z-z-z-oo-woof came a shell 
straight under the first of the naval guns. Every man 
round it stood his ground, and death licked his lean 
chops as he reached a bony arm towards them, but — 
the shell did not explode. Then number one gun was 



CORRESPONDENTS UNDER FIRE 241 

quickly hauled back a hundred yards, and while it 
was moving a shell chased it, and exploded within 
thirty yards. 

" I get no pay for this," said the handsomer and 
younger of the correspondents. " Let us go over and 
see what that heavy rifle-firing is about on the far right." 

" I'm rather taken with this," said his eager com- 
panion. " It's getting very lively. I'd like to see it 
out." 

But the first one would not stay, and as he carried 
lunch for both of them in his saddlebags, they went 
together and sat down out of gun range, to dine 
upon sardines, biscuits, water and cheese. Like the 
soft strains of an orchestra, the first correspondent 
sang his refrain about breach of faith to public and 
employer, which is perpetrated by a war correspondent 
who puts himself in the way of danger. 

An hour later each sat upon his separate ant-hill on 
the extreme right of the battle-field, where an endless 
awful volleying of rifle fire had sounded ever since day- 
break — hour upon hour. 

There then they sat, two thousand five hundred 
yards behind the firing-line of the British, who lay in 
rows upon their bellies firing at unseen Boers in an 
invisible trench, which spat out bullets as a needle- 
bath sprays water. The dead brown veldt lay empty 
between the two reporters and the battle — empty save 

that it was sparsely tufted with dried sage bush, and 
16 



242 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

studded at intervals with hard, conical ant-heaps, one, 
two, or three feet high, and all wide enough for shelter. 
Empty, except for these, and the mangled men who 
were crawling and hobbling out of the fight ; and the 
stretcher-bearers, who were either rushing in to pick 
them up, or else seeking covert, 

I fancy the younger correspondent was congratulat- 
ing himself upon his safety, but as he did so there 
came a sound like heavy hail upon a tin roof, and 
bullets whistled, pinged, and spatted all round him. 
The sound came from behind his back, for the Boers 
had made a flank movement, dashing furiously toward 
the ambulance and transport waggons, banging at 
them with a volley, and setting all the drivers and 
horses in a panic. It was then that these two inad- 
vertently ran straight into the danger zone of the 
main battle. 

If there is a place in action which is more dangerous 
than even the firing line, certainly it is the zone where 
the bullets strike the earth. Soldiers almost always 
shoot too high — over the heads of the foe before them, 
so that it is safer to be in the front than in the middle 
rear. To the middle rear ran these adventurers, and 
then fell down. They fell when they found the air 
as thick with bullets as ever a pudding was with 
plums — and when they saw that every movement was 
followed by a spurt of sand from falling shot. Have 
you ever seen a sorry tramp walking in the rain with 



CORRESPONDENTS UNDER FIRE 243 

water gushing from the holes in his boots ? The sand 
fountains reminded them of that. Both fell behind 
an ant-heap, and began to laugh. 

" There was no other way to run," they said to one 
another, " it looked as if the Boers would cut us off in 
any other direction." 

" Putt-putt-putt-putt," sounded the awful machine- 
gun from the heights, and its tornado of one-pound 
shells raked the air over their heads with seven scream- 
ing missiles at a time. Zizz-zit hummed the Mauser, 
and the Martini-Henry bullets, like magnified bees in 
swarms. The air was thick with flying lead. Bits of 
the friendly ant-hill were chipped off. Spray from 
the dust-jets thrown up by bullets fell softly on their 
hands as they lay motionless. Thicker and thicker 
came the hail, for the Boer sharpshooters had seen the 
two men run and drop, and were sending bullets to 
search the spot. They buried their noses in the red 
sand^ and talked and thought. 

" Say something funny," said the younger man. ** I 

wish young B was here. He'd keep us laughing. 

Wow ! but that was close. It fanned my ear." 

" I wonder what's become of our horses." 

" Hang the horses ! What I wonder is, how that 
silly mule can stand there a hundred yards ahead of 
us, where the bullets are like drops in a slanting rain. 
I'll bet the brute is full of holes and doesn't know it. 
Perhaps we are, too." 



244 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

" Hello ! here's that Guards doctor. Doctor ! Doc- 
tor! come and tell us what's going on." The Guards 
doctor is nothing loth. He dashes over to the cor- 
respondents, and in doing so awakens a new fury of 
rifle and machine-gun fire. 

"I can't stay long," he says ; "we've a great many 
wounded up there, and I must look after them. 
How's the fight going ? It's simply going on for ever, 
and neither side is budging. You think the bullets 
are thick here. Watch me go forward, and when you 
see me drop, you may know it's a bit thick. There's 
one place ahead where the shot come in solid streaks 
like telegraph wires. Well, ta-ta! I must make a 
dash for it." 

As he runs they watch, and see the tiny sand foun- 
tains spurt up before, beside, and behind him. At 
last he drops, and for half an hour lies quite still. 

For an hour and a half they keep their faces close 
to the veldt behind their ant-hill. Every now and 
again there comes a lull, and they think they will 
make a bolt for safety, and one raises his head or lifts 
an arm, whereupon the bullet factory opens again for 
business, and leaden streaks rake the air like a fine- 
toothed comb. They resign themselves, and watch 
other men in similar straits. 

They see a Coldstream Tommy run to a tiny sage 
bush that wouldn't stop a pea-shooter, and gratefully 
take its shelter. 



CORRESPONDENTS UNDER FIRE 245 

They see another lying flat as a flap-jack, and reach- 
ing stealthily, blindly, over the rough ground to 
gather little stones— none bigger than a hen's egg. 
He gets five or six of these and builds a whimsical 
shelter four inches wide and three inches high. He 
presses his face in the sand with this ridiculous toy 
wall in front of his crown. It is the best that he can 
do, and he is content. He is content until— ten min- 
utes later an explosive bullet hits his foot, and 
smashes it as if a heavy sledge-hammer had crushed it. 

He calls to the correspondents to bring the stretcher- 
bearers to him. Two of these have been hiding 
behind an ant-hill for a very long while. To them the 
correspondents yell, but the bearers are unable to 
hear. A Tommy looms up ahead dragging a shat- 
tered leg, hopping along before a pursuing blizzard of 
bullets. He, too, calls to the correspondents, ''for 
Heaven's sake, gentlemen, get me to an ambulance. 
I've been wounded like this for ten hours." At once 
they forget themselves and their danger, and, telling 
him with the shattered leg to go and lie by him with 
the crushed foot, they start through the rain of bul- 
lets to try to rouse the two bearers. 

They forget themselves and their danger, though 
there is death at every step — just as every man who 
is any good forgets self and danger on the battlefield 
if only he has something definite to do. 

Even if he has the jumps, give him a rifle and see 



246 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

how interested he will become. Send him galloping 
into the fire on an errand, and his funk will drop from 
him, as if the bullets had shot it away. 

A word of command to those stretcher-bearers 
brought them quickly to their feet. Then the corre- 
spondents had nothing to do, and then again the bullets 
pinged beside them, and buzzed about them, and they 
dropped flat on the veldt — with no shelter this time. 
There they lay a long time. A bullet touched the 
hair of one ; another flew between their heads, which 
were not eighteen inches apart. Three Tommies in 
full flight saw them, and ran towards them, bringing a 
cloud of shot along. 

" Keep away ! keep away ! you fools ! " the corre- 
spondents shouted. " Get yourselves killed as much 
as you like, but don't draw the fire on us. Lie down 
by yourselves, you idiots.'* This sudden outburst of 
abuse revealed how great had been the tension on their 
nerves. 

" It's telling on me," said the young and handsome 
one, " yet I am not conscious of being afraid." 

"There's no room for fear," said the other. "We 
know our danger. We can't help ourselves, and that's 
all there is about it. I'm sick of my lime-juice and 
water. Give me a drink of your plain essence of mi- 
crobes." 

Next a bullet-headed Tommy darted up from behind, 
and dropped beside the younger correspondent. Just 



CORRESPONDENTS UNDER FIRE 247 

Heaven ! how he was sworn at and abused, as a new 
hail of bullets showered around the three, attracted by 
his dash across the veldt. 

" If you would pull in that blooming tin pail, and 
put it under your tummy, you wouldn*t git so much o' 
the blooming bullets. It shoines loike a heliograph." 
He was right. He referred to a two-quart, bright, new 
tin water-bottle, which the elder man had left beside 
him on the ground. 

Of all the sublimated fools in any army, this Tommy 
was the worst. He next asked for a drink, and, taking 
a covered bottle, raised himself on his elbows, put up 
his head, lifted the bottle high, and began to quaff. 
A thousand rifle balls and ten minutes' play of the 
" putt-putt " showed that this had been accepted as a 
challenge. Again Tommy was sworn at for an idiot — 
and what was his reply ? 

" I know it. When I was loying hover there be'ind 
a hant-'ill, I 'eld up me blooming 'elmet, an' got a *ole 
put through it before I could get it down again." 

He was quieted by the impressive assurance that he 
would get a pistol ball through his skull at the next 
provocation, and for another half-hour he lay still. 
Then suddenly he said — 

" Gents, I'm blimed tired of planting me nose in 
the sand, and waiting for it to sprout. What I say is, 
let's run for it, each one in a different direckshin, so 
the blooming Boers won't know which to peg at." 



248 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

" You're a general, Tommy," said the correspond- 
ents ; "we're with you." 

He gave the word. All three ran like mad in dif- 
ferent ways, and the Boers directed their fire on the 
young and handsome correspondent. It was dusk, 
and jets of flame sprang out of the veldt all round him. 
But he was not hit. 



CHAPTER XXVII 

AN OPEN LETTER TO A FIELD-CORNET 

To Hermanns Swigelaar, Esq,, Boer Farmery Field- 
Cornet , of Ramdam, Orange Free State. 

MoDDER River, Feb. 6tk. 

Dear Sir, — You know how a man will sometimes 
leave a little thing behind him when he says good-bye 
— his goloshes, or umbrella, or gloves. 

Well, when I called on you in my Cape cart with a 
bit of the British army, and you chanced not to be at 
home, I came away without my cart. 

You may have been surprised, but I've seen men 
and women do more than that. I was walking about 
Havana once when everybody of both sexes left every- 
thing they had, and came out of the houses in just 
their complexions — but that was because an earth- 
quake occurred at precisely eleven in the morning, 
when they were all in their baths. 

The cart I overlooked is what is called a " cooper 

cart," and there is not a better in the country, so that 

it is absurd for you to think I left it as a present to a 

total stranger, or because I did not want it. 

249 



250 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

I asked your neighbour across the border, Colonel 
Macbean, of the Gordon Highlanders, to fetch it away 
with him, whenever he went to pay his courtesy call 
in return for our entertainment during the four-and- 
twenty hours we spent on your farm, when you were 
not at home. He now writes me that you have taken 
my cart to Jacobsdal, and that I must address all 
further correspondence on the subject to you. Colonel 
Macbean doubtless thinks himself a humourist, but you 
observe that I am taking his advice seriously. 

I want my cart or fifty pounds — in sovereigns, not 
Krugers. 

I had just as lief you should keep the cart, because 
it would serve as proof that I have been in your coun- 
try, and know what I am writing about ; therefore 
please bring the money to me in Lord Methuen's 
camp. We shall all be glad to see you, and may 
probably press you to stay with us — till the war is 
over. 

I was much interested in your district. It is the 
first corner of the enemy's country that I have visited, 
except Cape Colony. I like the Free State — a little. 
It is the worst place but one this side of the Sudan, 
the very worst being the region where Lord Methuen 
has been fighting. There was a suggestion of green 
herbage and foliage in your desert, and I was grateful 
for that. 

What a queer people you are to call yourselves 



AN OPEN LETTER 251 

farmers when you are in reality a mere lot of cow- 
boys ! 

Take your own " farm," for example, which appears 
to be the entire valley that surrounds you. A couple 
of miles from your house is a barbed-wire enclosure 
given up to corn, figs, mulberries, and peaches — a 
place the size of an ordinary vegetable garden in 
Finchley or Upper Norwood. Such a patch consti- 
tutes a man a farmer, it appears, though the rest of 
your valley is precisely as God made it, and your real 
business, like that of the Afridis, Turks, Servians, 
Albanians, and all other such folk, is cattle herding. 

The more I saw of Boer homes and surroundings the 
less I liked your people. I hope you don't mind my 
saying so. 

The little group of poplars in front of your house 
made the place very inviting from a distance, but 
when we reached your home, which is typical of all 
the others, v/hat did we see ? A garden, or a lawn, or 
flowers ? On the contrary, for a wide space all round 
your houses the veldt looks like a shooting-ground. 
Bones, discarded tins, bottles, skulls of cattle, putrefy- 
ing bodies of fowls and meer-cats, with rubbish of 
every sort, were lying about. 

Such are the surroundings of the homes of yourself 
and your wealthiest neighbours. 

And close beside, almost against your houses, you 
build your kraals — compounds walled in w'*-h rocks, 



252 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

where you keep your cattle, just where an English- 
man — or, for that matter, a Hollander — would cultivate 
a beautiful and glorious flower garden. 

Then, again, your houses are extremely primitive 
and rude. There must be some essential lacking, my 
dear Swigelaar, in a people who live close to the Eng- 
lish, and yet do not even learn how to consult their 
own comfort and convenience. There is a little scroll 
saw-work on one corner of your house. It makes the 
building look absurdly lop-sided, but it is the only su- 
perfluity — except a cat-o*-nine-tails for licking the black 
farm hands — that I saw during two days in your neigh- 
bourhood. 

Your houses are nothing but boxes with holes in 
them for doors and windows — and, actually, in your 
house, one or two rooms had no windows at all ! 
Your glossy-green floors are of pressed mud varnished 
with diluted cow-dung and blood. 

Believe me, these things help to show why your 
Republics are offered up for sacrifice ; they wallow in 
the past, with no hold on the future. 

I sat on your stoop, Swigelaar, with a pro-British 
Afrikander, who endeavoured to explain things in a 
way calculated to make me more lenient in my judg- 
ment. 

He said that only twenty-five years ago countless 
herds of deer of different sorts roamed over your 
alleged farm. You could not keep cattle, and if you 



AN OPEN LETTER 253 

cultivated any edible crop these blesbok, springbok, 
and steinbok would devour it. 

But you had no desire to grow anything, or keep 
any animal except a horse. Your people were hunt- 
ers, like their fathers, and you were so busy killing 
and eating antelope, and selling the skins, that in 1872 
one of five traders in a near-by village sent to England 
80,000 hides. The other four did quite as well, I 
believe. 

You only took up farming twenty years ago, and 
then you went in for cattle, and had to keep them 
close to your house on account of stray and hungry 
lions, and abundant wolves. That's all very well, 
Swigelaar, but you need not go on for ever farming 
with your little finger. It is time you took two hands 
to it now. And you do not fear any lion (except the 
British lion) in these days, therefore you can move 
your kraals and cattle away from your bedroom and 
sitting-room windows — unless you like the aroma. 

As I sat on your stoop I let my mind turn over 
many of the interesting things I have heard about 
what goes on in such houses as yours, all over the two 
Republics. 

I seemed to see the very occasional visitors ride or 
drive up, each one saluting you as '* neef " (cousin) if 
you were about his age, or *' 00m " (uncle) if you were 
older. 

If your visitor lived in the State, you were certain 



254 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

to know him ; if he was a stranger, you would remem- 
ber for twenty years what day he came, and what he 
said and did. 

You entertained your visitors on your long, broad 
stoop of rough and irregular stones, in the shadow of 
the mulberry tree, which has pushed its way up 
through them. If he carried any spirits you would 
drink with him, but you never produced for a guest 
any of the little gin you were apt to have indoors for 
your own and your family's use. To all you offered 
coffee, and, now and then, doughnuts made at the 
moment. 

Often these visitors were pedlars or traders, usually 
Hebrews. How frequently they tricked your neigh- 
bours, and sharpened the already fine cunning of your 
people ! 

You occasionally had to sign your name to neces- 
sary papers. What an event that was ! 

" Hush ! " cried your wife Petronella ; " father is 
going to sign his name." 

All was still as death, and the household stood 
a-tiptoe, and craned its neck to see you painting your 
autograph, while your mouth worked in concert with 
your pen. 

If you sold Ahasuerus some skins for thirty pounds, 
he offered you ten shillings to sign a receipt for forty, 
did he not? You did not hesitate, but grinned at 
getting ten shillings so easily. He wrote out the 



AN OPEN LETTER 255 

paper, you signed it, and your wife rolled her eyes at 
you and said, '' Oh, Hermanus, how dreadful clever 

you are ! " 

Six months later, you probably found that it was a 
promissory note you had signed— but let us not dwell 
upon the subject, Hermanus. 

Those whom you put up in your house now saw your 
singular dining customs. You men always eat first, 
while your wife cooks in the kitchen, and your daugh- 
ter—for whom you bought that amazing German 
melodeon that's in the sitzkammer (sitting-room)— 
moves about the table waving the flies away with a 
cloth, and wiping indiscriminately with it the plates 
or the baby's face. 

"Have you finished?" you inquire in due course, 

" then sit back.'* 

Now the women come in and eat their dinner from 
the men's unwashed plates. Very nice girls— who are 
young enough to bother about trifles— will scrape the 
d^hris of the man's meal to one side of the plate. 
Those who are absurdly squeamish, and want to put 
on side, will turn the dirty plate over, and eat off the 

bottom. 

The ornaments in a house reveal the taste of the 
family, and suggest its degree or quality of polish, 
which is civilisation. 

I look, therefore, at your ornaments with interest, 
Hermanus. On the walls are the patent-medicine 



256 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

almanacs given away at the store, and some chromo- 
lithograph pictures, given as advertisements. 

But the real proof of taste in every burgher's house 
is the wife's table in the sitting-room — you'll bear me 
out in that, Hermanus, won't you ? This table carries 
some yellow, blue, and green sugar and butter dishes, 
such as are given away with tea in the Old Kent 
Road. Perhaps there is also a tin dish, or little tray, 
washed over with brass. Whoever has such a table 
need hang his head before no burgher in the land. 

It is a Sunday evening and all are out on the stoop, 
when up rides a young man. 

From afar the sight of him makes you all smile — all 
except Miss Aletta, whose cheeks turn scarlet, as she 
rises and flees into the house. 

It's *' Coos " (Jacobus) Vandarbile, and he has come 
a-courting, as everyone may see by the blue puggaree 
wound around his hat, and the splendid saddle-cloth 
beneath him — an extra long cloth bordered with em- 
broidered roses. 

That hat-band and saddle-cloth form the livery of 
Cupid in your country, eh, Hermanus? 

Coos off-saddles, and salutes the family, taking you 
aside to ask if he may court Aletta. 

When sundown comes, and you and Petronella take 
to your bed as usual, Aletta and Coos sit up together 
in the sitzkammer, with only a curtain in the doorway 
between you and them. 



AN OPEN LETTER 257 

Maidenly modesty has led her to produce a very 
short bit of candle, which she lights and puts on the 
table, knowing that Coos must go to bed when it is 
burned out. He is not to go home, for no Boer trav- 
els at night. 

Coos sees the candle, and slily whips out a bit of his 
own three times as long, which he lights, and sets up, 
slipping Aletta's tiny piece into his pocket. Then he 
draws his chair up quite close, and sits with his shoulder 
against hers. 

They both giggle. Coos has a quarter of a pound 
of motto lozenges in one pocket, and a bottle of scent 
in another. 

He finds a lozenge marked " I love you," and puts 
it in Aletta's lap. 

Again she giggles. So does he. Then he gives her 
a handful of lozenges, to find one with an answer to 
his declaration. Talking in sweets lasts an hour, and 
at the end he gives her the bottle of scent. 

There is much more giggling, a little wrestling and 
horse-play, ending with a kiss, and the candle is at its 
last minute. 

Aletta slips behind the curtain into the family sleep- 
ing-room, and Coos goes to bed on the settee with its 
seat of crossed leather thongs. 

Very soon Petronella and Aletta will go to the store 

of Jacobsdal to buy the wedding outfit — a black gown, 

a print gown, cotton for a petticoat, a pair of stockings 
17 



258 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

(to be worn only on the wedding day), and a new pair 
of boots. 

Let us hope the wedding may not go amiss, like that 
of certain neighbours of yours, Hermanus. You re- 
member when two couples stood up together to be 
wedded, and the clergyman married the men to the 
wrong girls. 

They asked him to do it over again, and make it 
right, but he said he could not ; he would have to carry 
the matter before the higher authorities of the 
church. 

At this, you recollect, the young couples and all 
their relatives and friends said they could not wait, as 
the coffee and cakes would spoil. 

But the clergyman was firm. He declared that by 
himself he could not undo the marriage, and at that 
the couples decided to stay as they were, rather than 
waste the coffee and cakes. So they have been wrongly 
but happily mated ever since. 

After that do you still say yours are not a funny 
people, Hermanus? 

As I sat on your stoop I thought of all this, and of 
much more. I cannot, for instance, bring myself to 
like your sleeping in your clothes, or the way you 
treat the Kafifirs whom you virtually commandeer to 
work for you. 

Your morning and evening prayers would be com- 
mendable were it not that, after they are finished, you 



AN OPEN LETTER 259 

are so apt to boast of how you have tricked someone 
in trade, or pilfered something at the store. 

You are a born horseman, a born hunter, a good 
hater, a stubborn fighter as long as you can keep be- 
hind cover, but you are simple as wax in the hands of 
your foxy politicians, who should have seen that the 
wicked game they put up is a game of " tails we lose, 
and heads the other fellows win 1 " 

I am, my dear Hermanus, yours, &c., 

Julian Ralph. 



CHAPTER XXVIII 

THE RELIEF OF KIMBERLEY 

Field-Marshal Lord Roberts, with his distin- 
guished Chief of Staff, Lord Kitchener, arrived at 
Capetown in January, and after supervising the prep- 
aration of a larger force than had, up to that time, 
been employed in the war, he went to the front. He 
visited De Aar, Orange River, and the practically 
united camp of twenty thousand men which extended 
from Orange River to Maaghersfontein, and was 
commanded partly by Major-General Wood, and, at 
Modder River, where the greater part was encamped, 
by General Lord Methuen. 

Everywhere the soldiers responded to the presence 
of Lord Roberts as if it were electrical, and it was felt 
that a new and brighter turn in the course of the war 
had been reached. 

At about the same time General French and the 
greater part of the force with which he had been 
operating at Colesberg slipped away to join the Field- 
Marshal's army without the Boers getting knowledge, 

I believe, of the nature of his movement. 
260 



THE RELIEF OF KIMBERLEY 261 

General Sir Hector Macdonald, leading the now 
newly-invigorated Highland Brigade, marched twenty 
miles to the westward of Modder River Camp to divert 
the attention of the enemy from what was going on 
under General Roberts. 

The Highlanders engaged the enemy at Koodoos- 
berg with measurable success ; that is to say, they put 
the Boers to flight but, as had been the almost un- 
broken rule with our troops in this war, they failed to 
capture either their guns or any considerable number 
of prisoners. For this the cavalry under General Bab- 
bington had been called upon, but did not reach the 
scene until they had managed to escape. 

Practically all the cavalry in the western border of 
the Free State were now ordered to General French's 
command. General Colville commanding the Guards 
was transferred to a new division formed on the spot. 
Brigadier-General Pole-Carew took over the Guards, 
and to Colonel Douglas, who had been on Methuen's 
staff, was given the Ninth Brigade in place of Pole- 
Carew — the brigade which contained the " Fighting 
Fifth " (Northumberlands), and Colonel Barter's York- 
shire Light Infantry, troops which had borne most of 
the brunt of the fighting in three of Lord Methuen's 
four engagements. They and the valorous Guards' 
Brigade were left with General Methuen to guard the 
line and watch Maaghersfontein. 

Within a week after his arrival at the front Lord 



262 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

Roberts was moving into the Free State with forty- 
five thousand men. The chosen point of invasion was 
just below Graspan, by the passage between hills 
through which the Australians and New Zealanders 
had cleared the way for General Babbington's extra- 
cautious and generally unimportant manoeuvre of the 
second week in January. 

The sight of Lord Roberts' great army in motion 
was inspiriting and magnificent, but the conditions 
surrounding it were such as seemed to give the usually 
recumbent Boers great odds. It was the hottest time 
in the summer of that region. The heat, which became 
insufferable at five o'clock in the morning, reached 
broiling point by nine o'clock, and knew no abatement 
until the sun sank. The parched veldt, suffering from 
an almost rainless summer, had turned its surface into 
powder, and the hot wind, playing with this, half 
smothered the troops in floury dust almost continu- 
ously during daylight each day and once during an 
entire night. 

French had gone ahead with his three divisions of 
cavalry to move with a rapidity which took no account 
of the heat, though the native horses of the Boers, 
after one-third as much work, afterward succumbed to 
exhaustion, and delivered more than three score of the 
enemy's laden waggons into our hands. 

But it must be remembered that General French's 
force was mounted. Fancy the strain which the heat, 



THE RELIEF OF KIMBERLEY 263 

the dust, and the absence of water, imposed upon the 
foot-soldiers under the Field-Marshal ! In one day 
about sixty men fell out of the ranks, stricken down 
by the sun. 

It was at daybreak of February 12th, that the bulk 
of General Roberts's army started for the Free State, 
arriving at Rarndan — an abandoned farmhouse long 
used as a laager — at eleven o'clock, a. m., and resting 
there. General French and his three brigades of 
mounted men had made an earlier start. The enemy 
was caught napping, for the Boers in that part of the 
country were all watching a body of'mounted infantry 
that was marching up from Orange River to Jacobsdal. 

On Monday, February 12th, General French, who 
had been following the Riet River on its southern side, 
crossed it at Waterfall Drift, but only after beating 
some Boers with guns who attempted to hold the 
fording place. The enemy retreated, and General 
French and his troops crossed, leaving his transport to 
follow. 

The transport was viciously attacked, in its turn, 
but being well defended by the guarding force that 
accompanied it, also crossed the river after unimportant 
loses. 

On the next day. General French reached and forded 
the Modder River at Klip Drift, where he came upon 
a large Boer camp, which he seized, with all its valuable 
furnishings. 



264 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

As the march continued the greatest pains were 
taken to suppress the predatory instincts of Tommy 
Atkins, who is but human, after all, and to secure the 
goods of the Boers against plunder. 

It is a diametrically different course to that which 
the Boers pursue upon British territory. It differs 
from the common custom of armies in the country of 
their foes ; and it was certain to draw from the Boers 
contempt in place of gratitude ; but so it was, and we 
kept order to such an extent that at one point our 
men asked leave of some women to gather fruit in a 
garden. The Boer men showed a refined and lofty 
appreciation of our sense of honor. They hid in the 
garden and shot down our men when they came there. 

Having crossed the Modder, General French moved 
rapidly on toward Kimberley, which he reached and 
entered on Wednesday. At Alexandersfontein he scat- 
tered a large force of the enemy, and seized a large 
laager and d^pot of supplies and ammunition. 

When he reached Kimberley he had only lost one 
ofificer killed, and twenty, in all ranks, wounded — a 
small price to pay for so dramatic and skilful an ex- 
pedition, and for restoring the high hopes and en- 
thusiasm of every Britisher in South Africa. There 
was almost a deHrium of rejoicing when the news 
reached the various colonies and their capitals. 

In the meantime Jacobsdal was taken by Roberts's 
force. This little white and yellow village, with its 



THE RELIEF OF KIMBERLEY 265 

German hospital and imposing Presbyterian church 
beside a tree-bordered single street with a ditch on one 
side, had been tempting Methuen's army for two 
months. It was the headquarters of Cronje and the 
Boers who fought us at Modder River and Maaghers- 
fontein, and it contained great stores of food and am- 
munition. We might have seized it on the day after 
the fight at Maaghersfontein — so a number of military 
experts have said — but we missed the chance. 

While General French was in the neighbourhood of 
Jacobsdal the outposts were plagued, as by mosquitoes, 
by Boers from that village. A small force was sent to 
the place, but was met by rifle fire from the houses and 
garden-walls, and both Briton and Boer kept their 
positions till night, when the British left a guard and 
advanced with the army. 

On the next day, the 15th of February, our artillery 
routed the enemy. They escaped from the village but 
were obliged to pass over a ridge in full view of our 
gunners, who riddled them with shrapnel. Thus we 
gained that point, and found, as we had supposed, that 
the stores had been removed to Boshof, and that the 
place was now merely used for the care of the Boer 
sick and wounded. 

I was laid up with a troublesome bruise, and am only 
repeating the accounts I have received from others. 
They say that all the wretched, semi-barbarous inhab- 
itants of the place who appeared in the streets wore 



266 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

Red Cross badges on their arms. They seem never to 
tire, or to learn to feel the disgrace, of misusing that 
sacred emblem. They welcomed the British " not as 
enemies but as friends." They expressed surprise that 
their stores were not looted, they anathematised their 
President, who had betrayed them, they vowed that 
they were sick of the war. 

Bah ! how long are our leaders to be tricked by such 
duplicity and cunning ? How sickening becomes 
their double-dealing when one learns the truth about 
their character ! They are all things to all men. 
They shift their coats more quickly than any rapid- 
change-artist of the music-halls. 

They are rampant, blatant English haters, thirsting 
for English blood, but the instant one is taken prisoner, 
or brought wounded to a British hospital, and finds 
himself among Englishmen, no one can vie with him 
in expressing admiration for the British, in condemning 
his own folly for having fought so noble a foe, and in 
so hopeless a cause. Gratitude he does not know or 
feign, and the kind treatment he gets he always looks 
upon as a proof of the weakness or the idiocy of his 
captors. 



CHAPTER XXIX 

RECORD OF THE SIEGE 

The siege of Kimberley lasted precisely four 
months and two days. The skilfully directed energy 
and pluck of its armed men under Colonel Kekewich, 
the great store of provisions that had been hoarded 
there principally by the De Beers Company, and the 
excellent natural fortifications made by the great 
mounds of earth thrown out of the diamond pits and 
enclosing three sides of the town, were its threefold 
safeguard and salvation. 

Four days after war had been declared — that is to 
say, on October 14th — the military commandant, 
Lieut.-Colonel Kekewich, noticed suspicious activity 
on the part of the Boers, who had appeared in consid- 
erable numbers both to the north and the south of the 
town. Lieut-Colonel Kekewich commanded about 
two thousand men — the North Lancashire Regiment, 
the Diamond Fields Horse, and a considerable Town 
Guard. 

Communication with Capetown by both wire and 

rail had been unmolested, and a special train had but 

267 



268 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

just come in from the Cape with tons of food supplies. 
But on this day the wires southward had been cut, and 
the people learned that the Boers had also mutilated 
the railway line. All this happened near Spytfontein, 
where the army of the unfortunate Methuen two and 
a half months later advanced to battle and was re- 
pulsed at Maaghersfontein. 

On October 15th, at dawn, the armoured train, com- 
manded by Lieutenant Webster of the Lancashires, 
and supported by the Diamond Fields Horse, recon- 
noitred in the direction of Spytfontein, where the veldt 
is commanded by some formidable kopjes — the last 
ones on the road to the Diamond City from the south. 

The armoured train was assaulted by artillery fire, 
but was not damaged, nor were any of the British 
killed or wounded ; but their response with Maxim 
guns and rifles killed five Boers and wounded a large 
number. 

An hour before noon on that morning the alarm was 
sounded by the De Beers whistles. All the troops in 
town were gathered in camp, interest in the diamond 
mines became subordinated to the impulse for self- 
preservation, and the place become military first and 
all else after that. 

Martial law was at once proclaimed. The thorough- 
ness of the orders then issued showed that the leading 
spirits of the place had foreseen that the attractions 
of the diamond beds and the presence of Cecil Rhodes 



RECORD OF THE SIEGE 269 

in the place would render it a marked object of cov- 
etous attraction to the enemy. Indeed, when all the 
facts are made known, the forethought and liberality 
expended upon the provisioning of Kimberley, espe- 
cially if not solely by the De Beers Company, will 
strike the world as extraordinary. 

The notice proclaiming martial law enjoined all 
citizens to refrain from having any dealings with the 
enemy, to remain indoors after 9 p.m. and before 
6 a.m., or else provide themselves with special passes 
— unless they were members of the various military 
forces ; to immediately give notice of the possession 
of any arms or ammunition, and so on. 

Thus began the new order of things, and the siege 
of that feverish little capital whose entire existence 
had been flushed with excitement. 

As was to have been expected, some of the mer- 
chants were more businesslike than compassionate, and 
set to work to squeeze inordinate profits out of the 
helplessness of their neighbours. They reckoned with- 
out thought of the baronial De Beers management and 
of Cecil Rhodes, alike too broad, too humane, and too 
sensible of the responsibility of their power to permit 
the fleecing of the many through the cupidity of the 
few. 

Therefore it was that, on October 20th, the follow- 
ing order by the Mayor, countersigned by Major 
W. A. T. O'Meara, was issued : — 



270 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

" Large advances having taken place in local stores 
on some of the necessaries of life, and there being a 
likelihood of supplies running short if sold out in large 
quantities, the following prices have been fixed with 
the local tradesmen until further notice, and no goods 
are to be sold at higher prices than those mentioned 
hereunder: Fresh salmon, kippered herrings, &c., is. 
3d. per tin ; sugar, all kinds, 4d. per lb. ; rice, 3d. per 
lb. ; condensed milk, is. per tin ; candles, is. per 16 oz. 
packet ; corned beef, i lb. tins, is. 3d. ; 2 lb. tins, 2s. ; 
bacon, is. 6d. per lb. ; Boer meal, sifted, 3d. per lb. ; 
Boer meal, unsifted, 2^d. per lb. ; tea and coffee, no 
advance on original prices. All other necessaries to 
be sold at same prices as before communication was 
cut off. Any departure from the above will be dealt 
with by the military authorities. Merchants and 
holders of provision stocks are hereby empowered to 
sell only in such quantities as they deem necessary, 
according to the number in the purchaser's family." 

All stores were ordered to close at 5.30 o'clock in 
the evening, excepting Saturdays, when they might 
keep open two hours later. 

From that best of South African journals, the Cape 
Times, I take the liberty of quoting an account of the 
military movements which took place during the siege 
and defence of the town. Of other matters, the health 
and comparative happiness of the people, their un- 
varying good behaviour, and the manner in which their 



RECORD OF THE SIEGE 271 

stores were husbanded without consequent privation, 
there is little or nothing to be said. 

Several runners who came to Methuen's army re- 
ported at different times that the feeding of the native 
labourers, in the compounds at the mines, gave the 
authorities a great deal of trouble and uneasiness. 
There were thousands of these blacks. Twice they 
had been released, and had started for their distant 
homes, but had each time been turned back by the 
Boers. 

But to adhere to what I know. Every night during 
all those weeks Kimberley flashed its searchlight 
signal " All well " to General Methuen and his force — 
every night but one, I should say, for there was one 
night, that of the battle of Modder River (November 
28th), when we did not dare to communicate with them 
lest the Boers should shell our searchlight. 

That was a sorry night for the Kimberley folk, be- 
cause they had heard our guns and had counted upon 
a report of our victory. They roamed their streets all 
night, and, getting no signal from us by daybreak, re^ 
tired to their beds crushed by the fear that we had 
been beaten — as, alas ! we were to be at the very next 
encounter, five miles onward, at Maaghersfontein. 

On October 24th a hot engagement took place out- 
side Kimberley. Before daybreak a patrol of Mounted 
Police and Volunteers was despatched under Colonel 
Scott-Turner to make a reconnaissance northward, 



272 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

beyond Macfarlane's Farm. An armoured train sup- 
ported them. Colonel Scott-Turner made early con- 
tact with the enemy, who were first seen in scattered 
parties but quickly appeared in considerable force, en- 
deavouring by manoeuvres to the right to get between 
him and the armoured train. 

Learning that fighting had begun, Colonel Kekewich 
sent a train with a detachment of the North Lan- 
cashires, commanded by Major Murray, and two guns 
and the Diamond Fields Artillery, with Captain May. 

The enemy despatched a force to intercept the guns, 
occupying a strong position on a wooded ridge on the 
right of the road, and opened fire furiously at eight 
hundred yards range before our guns were unlimbered. 

At the critical moment the North Lancashires re- 
turned to the train, which had gone further north, and 
attacked the kopjes, driving the enemy out, the volley- 
firing being effective. The Boers then beat a hasty 
retreat. The body of Commandant Botha of Boshof, 
the Boer leader, was found shot with a Lee-Metford 
bullet through the right breast. Our losses were four 
killed and nineteen wounded. The Boer loss was 
heavy. 

On November i6th a force of mounted men, with 
a detachment of Volunteer Artillery, made a sortie 
under Colonel Scott-Turner. 

A somewhat heavy mist delayed the advance, and 
as it lifted the Boers, were discovered in possession of 



RECORD OF THE SIEGE 273 

the schanzes between Carter's Farm and the reservoir. 
The enemy at once opened fire, and several of our 
men were hit during the first few volleys. Our guns 
and Maxims were at once brought into action, and the 
Royal Artillery shelled the Boers' guns posted on the 
ridge above the lazaretto. 

The fight lasted from ten minutes past five o'clock 
to half-past six o'clock, when Colonel Scott-Turner, 
having ascertained that the enemy were in force, re- 
turned to Kimberley. The British loss was one killed 
and eight wounded. Seven Boers were killed and 
several wounded. 

In the sortie which took place a week later Major 
Scott-Turner met his death while gallantly leading his 
men to the attack in an engagement at Coster's Farm. 

The Kimberley sortie was made with a view of cap- 
turing a large Boer gun which had been placed in the 
vicinity of the lazaretto. The force rushed Coster's 
Farm, and proceeded to take the redoubts leading to 
the gun. They took four of these strongholds, but at 
the last redoubt the Boers sent a heavy fire into the 
force, and our men retired to Coster's Farm. 

While Lord Methuen was engaging the enemy the 
bombardment of Kimberley, which had been almost 
incessant from the middle of October, eased off con- 
siderably, but after Maaghersfontein it was renewed 
with considerable vigour. The shells, however, did 
comparatively little harm. 



2/4 TOWARDS PRETORIA 

About the middle of November shells made at De 
Beers workshops were used by the garrison with telling 
effect, and early in January a 28-pounder gun was 
manufactured at the De Beers workshops, and was 
christened " Long Cecil " as a tribute to Mr. Rhodes, 
who had exhibited the greatest coolness during the 
siege, devoting his leisure to providing comforts to the 
wounded, and planting trees to form what will be 
known in history as Siege Avenue. 

Heliographic communication with Kimberley was 
established on December 4th. 

The local paper of December 25th said : Excepting 
two or three of our inhabitants, who shared the terrible 
privations during the siege of Paris, few of us have 
ever spent such a Christmas before, and few will ever 
care to spend such a Christmas again. 

There was a scarcity of turkeys and plum-pudding 
this time, and of the traditional plenty, but this only 
distressed the gourmand. The majority of the people 
of Kimberley are happily made of sterner stuff, and do 
not look for luxuries during a time of siege. Never- 
theless, Mr. Rhodes has again come to the rescue, and 
is providing some forty-two plum-puddings cooked at 
the Sanatarium, for distribution between the various 
camps. 

Seasonable wishes are freely interchanged by tele- 
phone. " Best wishes and a larger range to your guns " 
was received by the Royal Artillery from the Mounted 



RECORD OF THE SIEGE 275 

Camp, to which the following reply was sent : " Good 
wishes reciprocated. May our range be always long 
enough to be a guardian angel to the Mounted Corps." 
Notwithstanding the festivities, additional precautions 
were taken to prevent the enemy from catching us 
napping. 

Later news showed that the bombardment con- 
tinued, that " Long Cecil " replied to the enemy's 
attack, and that the garrison suffered little or no loss. 
On the 9th of February the despatch of press messages 
from Kimberley was temporarily forbidden, owing 
presumably to the necessity for reticence as to the 
initial stages of the progress of General French, so 
quickly to be attended with the happiest result to the 
patient and hopeful little beleaguered city. 



APPENDICES 



APPENDIX I. 

CHIEF EVENTS OF THE WAR. 

1899. 

Oct. 10.— Boer ultimatum delivered. 
ii._War begins. 

I. 

Natai< Campaign. 

12.— Boer troops entered Natal. 
1 3. --Newcastle abandoned. 
14.— Newcastle occupied by Boers. 
18.— Action near Acton Homes. 

Boers advanced towards Glencoe. 
19.— Train captured by the Boers at Elandslaagte. 
20.— Battle of Glencoe. 

Boers capture large number of Hussars. 
2i.--Battle at Elandslaagte. 

Second attack on Glencoe. 
22.— General Yule retreated from Dundee. 
23. — Boers entered Dundee. 

Death of General Symons. 
24. — Engagement at Rietfontein. 
26. —General Yule's column arrived at Ladysmith. 
30.— Disaster of Nicholson's Nek. 
jjov. 9.— British victory at Lady smith. 

15.— Armoured train derailed at Chieveley : Mr. Wmston 

Spencer Churchill captured. 
23.— Engagement at Beacon Hills. 



278 APPENDICES 

Nov. 25. — Sir Redvers Buller's arrival in Natal. 
26. — British advance from Kstcourt. 
28. — Boers blew up Colenso Bridge. 
Dsc. 8. — Sortie from Ladysmith. Three large Boer guns 

destroyed and Maxim captured. 
10. — Sortie from Ladysmith. Gun blown up. 
14. — Mr. Winston Spencer Churchill reported to have 

escaped from Pretoria. 
15. — Sir Redvers BuUer suffered reverse while attempting to 

force the passage of the Tugela. 
21. — Mr. Winston Churchill arrived at Lourenzo Marques. 
Jan. 6. — Boer attacks in force on I^adysmith beaten off. 
10. — Forward movement for the relief of Ladysmith. 
II. — Sir Redvers Buller occupied the south bank of the 

Tugela at Potgieter's Drift, 
lyord Dundonald and Mounted Brigade crossed the 

Tugela at Potgieter's Drift. 
15. — Death of Mr. G. W. Steevens, Correspondent of the 

Daily Mail, at Ladysmith. 
16. — General Lyttelton's Brigade crossed the Tugela at 

Potgieter's Drift. 
17. — Sir Charles Warren's Division crossed the Tugela at 

Trichard's Drift. 
General Lyttelton's Brigade shelled the Boers. 
18. — The Tugela bridged and crossed by a brigade and 

battery. 
20. — Sir C. Warren moved towards Spion Kop. 
21. — Heavy fighting by General Clery's forces. 
22. — Sir C. Warren's entire army engaged. 
23. — Spion Kop captured by Sir C. Warren : General Wood- 
gate wounded. 
25. — Abandonment of Spion Kop. 
27. — Sir C. Warren's force withdrawn to the south of the 

Tugela. 
Feb. 5.— General Buller crossed the Tugela at Manger's Drift. 
6. — General Buller captured Vaal Krantz Hill. 
7.— Vaal Krantz Hill evacuated and the Tugela recrossed. 

General Buller captured Monte Cristo. 
20.— General Hart crossed the Tugela and occupied Colenso. 
26.— General Buller returned to the south of the Tugela. 



APPENDICES 279 

Feb. 27. — Pieters Hill stormed and Boers' main position carried. 

28. — Relief of Ladysmith. 
Mar. 2. — General BuUer formally entered I^adysmith. 



Orange Free State Campaign. 

Oct. 12. — Mr. Rhodes arrived at Kimberley. 
20. — Fighting near Kimberley, 
31. — Sir Redvers BuUer arrived at Cape Town. 
Nov. 2. — Fighting on Tatham's Farm, near Besters. 
Colenso evacuated. 

Ladysmith isolated and communication cut off. 
3. — Stormberg abandoned. 

10.— Engagement to the east of Belmont : Colonel Keith- 
Falconer killed. 
12.— Lord Methuen arrived at Orange River. 
20. — Lord Methuen 's force reached Witteputs. 
23. — Battle of Belmont. 
25.— Battle of Bnslin. 
28.— Battle of Modder River. 

Boer laager near Kimberley captured. 
Dec. 8. — Engagement at Graspan. 

10.— Lord Methuen moved forward from Modder River and 

bombarded enemy's trenches. 
II.— Battle of Maaghersfontein : General Wauchope killed. 
12.— Lord Methuen retired to Modder Bridge. 
23.— Departure of Lord Roberts from Southampton. 
Jan. 9.— British troops invaded Free State Territory near Jacobs- 
dal. 



APPENDIX n. 

ARMY DECORATIONS AND PROMOTIONS FOR GAIr 
LANTRY, ETC., AT THE SEAT OF WAR. 

V.C. 

Announced February 2, 1900. 

Captain W. N. Congreve, Rifle Brigade, Colenso, Dec. 15, 1899. 
Late Ivieut. Hon. F. H. S. Roberts, K. R. R., Colenso, Dec. 15, 

1899. 
Corporal G. E. Nurse, R. F. A., Colenso, Dec. 15, 1899. 
Captain H. ly. Reed, R. F. A., Colenso, Dec. 15, 1899. 

Distinguished Service in the Fiei^d (D.S.O.) 
Announced February 2, 1900. 
Corporal A. Clark, Colenso, Dec. 15, 1899. 





C( 


R. J. Money, 


(( 


(C 


Actin 


g Bombardier J. H. Reeve, 


(( 


« 


Drive 


r H. Taylor, 


(( 


(( 






H. G. Young, 


c< 


cc 






J. E. Petts, 


« 


« 






G. Rockall, 


ft 


tt 






E. W. Lucas, 


«c 


tt 






F. Williams, 


<c 


n 






C. J. Woodward, 


tt 


<c 






W. Robertson, 


It 


«• 






W. Wright, 


*t 


it 






A. C. Hawkins, 


<« 


K 






J. P. Lennox, 


« 


K 






A. Nugent (late), 


tl 


(C 






J. Warden, 


it 


C( 






A. Felton, 


tl 


(C 


(C 


T. Musgrove, 


(( 


*c 


Tn 


impeter W. W. Ayles, 


(( 


iU 



APPENDICES 281 

Announced March 13, 1900. 
Private G. H. Day, 6th Dragoon Guards, Arundel. 

ARMY PROMOTIONS. 

Announced February 19, 1900. 

Colonel and local Lieut. -General French, Major-General, Relief of 

Kimberley, Feb. 16, 1900. 
Irieut. -Colonel Kekewich, Colonel. Relief of Kimberley, Feb. 16, 

1900. 

NAVAL PROMOTIONS. 

C.B. 

Announced March 13, 1900. 

Captain Hon. H. Lambton, H. M. S. Terrible, for services in South 

Africa. 
Captain Percy M. Scott, H. M. S. Terrible, for services in South 

Africa. 



Lieut. F. C. A. Ogilvy, H. M. S. Terrible, to be Commander, for 
services under Sir R. Buller. 

MISCELLANEOUS. 

Bugler Dunn, ist Royal Dublin Fusiliers. Colenso, Dec. 15, 1899. 

Received by Queen Feb. 19, 1900, and presented with silver 

bugle. 
The Irish regiments to wear Shamrock. Order March 8, 1900. 



APPENDIX in. 

THE COMMANDS IN SOUTH AFRICA. 

I^ield Marshal Lord Roberts, K.P., V.C., &c., Commander-in- 
Chief. 

Staff, 

Major-General Lord Kitchener, G.C.B., Chief of the Staff. 

Major-General Pretyman, C.B., Commandant Headquarters. 

Major-General G. Marshall, Commanding Royal Artillery. 

Major-General B. Wood, C.B., Chief of Engineers. 

Surgeon-General W. Wilson, M.B., Principal Medical Officer. 

Sir William MacCormac, Bart., K.C.V.O., Chief Consulting 
Surgeon. 

Lieut. -General Sir F. W. E. T. Forestier- Walker, Commanding 
lines of Communication. 

Brigadier-General J, Wolfe Murray, Brigadier on lines of Com- 
munication. 

Major-General Sir F. Carrington, K.C.B., on Special Service. 

Major-General W. Kelly, C.B., on Special Service. 

Ladysmith. 

Lieut. -General Sir G. White, V.C., in Command. 
Major-General Sir A. Hunter, Second in Command. 
Acting Brigadier^ General Colonel Ian Hamilton. 
Acting Brigadier-General Colonel F. Howard. 
Major-General Brocklehurst, M.V.O., Cavalry. 

Army of Relief. 

General Sir R. H. BuUer, V.C., in Command in NataL 

Generals of Divisions, 

Lieut. -General Sir C. F. Clery, 2nd Division. 
Lieut. -General Sir C. Warren, 5th Division. 
282 



APPENDICES 283 

Generals of Brigade. 

Major-General Hon. N. G. Lyttelton, 4th Brigade. Acting as 
General of Division since the withdrawal of General Clery, 
wounded. 

Major-General A. Fitzroy Hart, 5th Brigade. 

Major-General G. Barton, 6th Brigade. 

Major-General H. J. T. Hildyard, 2nd Brigade. 

Major-General A. S. Wynne (vice Woodgate, wounded) 9th 
Brigade. 

Major-General J. T. Coke, loth Brigade. 

Acting Major-General Colonel Kitchener, specially formed Brigade. 

Acting Major-General Colonel Northcott, specially formed Brigade. 

Acting Major-General I^ord Dundonald, Cavalry. 

Main Army undkr IvOrd Roberts. 
Generals of Division. 

lyieut. -General Lord Methuen, ist Division. 
Lieut. -General Kelly-Kenny, C.B., 6th Division. 
Lieut. -General Tucker, 7th Division. 
Acting Lieut. -General Sir H. Colville, 9th Division. 
Acting Lieut. -General J. D. P. French, Cavalry Division. 
Acting Lieut. -General J. P. Brabazon, Imperial Yeomanry Division. 
Acting Major-General J. M. Babington, Assistant-Adjutant-Gen- 
eral. 

Generals of Brigade — Infantry. 

Major-General Pole-Carew, ist Brigade. 
Major-General Douglas, 9th Brigade. 
Major-General H. Macdonald, 3rd Brigade. 
Major-General Knox (wounded), 12th Brigade. 
Major-General Smith Dorrien, 13th Brigade. 
Major-General Sir H. Chermside, 14th Brigade. 
Major-General A. G. Wavell, 15th Brigade. 

Generals of Brigade — Cavalry and Mounted Infantry. 
Acting Major-General Broadwood (loth Hussars), ist Cavalry 

Brigade. 
Acting Major-General Porter (6th Dragoon Guards), 2nd Cavalry 

Brigade. 



284 APPENDICES 

Acting Major-General Gordon (i6th Lancers), 3rd Cavalry 

Brigade. 
Acting Major-General Henry, Mounted Infantry Brigade. 
Acting Major-General Ridley, Mounted Infantry Brigade. 

The name of the commander of the third mounted infantry 
brigade, in succession to Acting Major-General Hannay, recently 
killed, has not yet been announced. 

Central Columns : North Cape Colony. 

Sterkstroom Column : Lieut. -General Sir W. F. Gatacre. 
Rensburg Column : Major-General R. A. P. Clements, D.S.O. 
Dordrecht Column : Major-General Brabant, Commanding Colonial 
Mounted Infantry Division. 

En route to the Cape, 

Lieut. -General Sir H. M. Rundle, 8th Division. 
Major-General Campbell, M.V.O., i6th Brigade. 
Major-General J. E. Boyes, 17th Brigade. 
Major-General J. B. B. Dickson, C.B., 4th Cavalry Brigade. 



APPENDIX IV. 
TABLES OF BRITISH AND BOER ORDNANCE.* 

The following tables are not intended to set up invidious com- 
parisons between our own and the foreign- made artillery, with 
which our enemy has equipped himself ; their mission is simply to 
furnish information concerning a subject which of all military sub- 
jects it is the most difficult for the civilian to follow intelligently. 
The headings, by the side of which the various details of dimen- 
sion, weight, &c., connected with each piece of ordnance, together 
with those of its projectiles, are arranged, have been carefully se- 
lected so as to show all that it is most important to show without 
entering into abstruse technicalities. 

These headings, such as " Gun," " Construction," "Calibre," 
&c. , explain themselves, but a few words may be added concerning 
** Maximum Range with Common Shell." This, in fact, is 
intended to demonstrate the maximum effective range of the gun, 
which is always based upon range practice with this particular 
type of projectile, the reason being that the other two standard 
types — viz., shrapnel and case shot — either by their mechanism or 
construction, themselves govern the range at which they can be 
employed. For example, the time fuse, upon which the efficacy 
of the shrapnel shell rests, is not yet constructed to act at ranges 
beyond 5,000 yards ; while case shot, which consists of a canister 
of balls that separate from their envelope on leaving the muzzle, is 
not effective beyond 800 yards from sheer lack of motive power. 
But common shell, or locomotive mine, bursts upon impact, which 
may mean not till it has reached the limit of the force exercised by 
the carrying powers of its gun. 

Elevation, again, has much to do with the question of range. 
The provision for high elevation alone accounts for the marked 
superiority in this particular exhibited by the 15 cm. and 12 cm. 
Creusot guns over our 4.7 in., 6 in., and 12-pounder naval guns, 
also by the i4X-pounder Creusot field piece over our 15-pounder. 
Our naval guns, it must be remembered, have been primarily de- 

* (Reprinted by the kind permission of the Editor of the Daily Chronicle.') 

285 



286 



APPENDICES 



signed for use against ships on ships or coast defences, and in these 
circumstances they employ of course armour-piercing shells. The 
latter must penetrate the target aimed at, hence in their flight flat- 
ness of trajectory is essential. Now it stands to reason that flatness 
of trajectory vanishes when the gun is fired at anything above a 
small angle of elevation. Therefore, the distances scheduled in 
the following tables, which are those for which the three pieces 
are sighted in their normal employment, are doubtless being 
greatly exceeded from the extra elevation that is sure to have been 
allowed for in Captain Scott's land carriages. In the case of the 
field guns mentioned our 15-pounder cannot be elevated more than 
16 degrees, as compared to the 20 degrees of the Boer weapon — a 
difference quite sujOScient to account for the superiority of the latter 
in maximum range : — 



Table A.- 


—British Guns 


OF Position. 






Naval Service. 
* * * 


Siege Train. 




Land Service. 


Howitzer. 




4P7Q-F. 
B. L. Gun 


6-in. Q. F. 
B. L. Gun 


i2-pr.Q.F. 
B. L. Gun 


5-in. 
B. L. Gun 


4-in. 
B. L. Gun 


6-in. 
B.L. 


Construction 

Calibre, inches 

Total length of gun, 
inches 


Wire 
4.72 

195-^ 

42 cwt. 

2,188 

?t 

Common 

Shell 

45 
Lyddite 

9,000 


Wire 
6 

249.2 

7 tons 

2,000 

?t 

Common 

SheU 

100 

Lyddite 
or 
Powder 

10,000 


Steel 
3 

123.6 

12 cwt. 

2,210 

?t 

Common 

Shell 

12.5 

Powder 

8,000 


Steel 

5 

139-5 

40 cwt. 
1.750 

Common 

Shell 
Shrapnel 
SO 

Lyddite 

236 
8,700 


Steel 
4 

120 

26 cwt. 

1,900 

Common 

Shell 

Shrapnel 

25 

Powder 

134 
7,700 


Steel 
6 

94 


Nominal weight of 
gun, including 
breech 

Muzzle velocity, feet 
per second 

If Q.F., rate of aimed 
fire per minute 

Prniprtilp"; 


30 cwt. 
779 

Common 


Weight of ditto, lbs. 
Explosive in Com- 
mon Shells 

Bullets in Shrapnel 

Max. Range with 

Common Shell,yds. 


Shell 

Shrapnel 

ii8J^ 

Lyddite 

518 
10,000 



*These three types of Naval Guns are all mounted upon Captain Percy Scott's im- 
provised land carriages. The 6-in. gun was taken from the Terrible on Feb. 12th, or 
thereabouts, and sent to Durban on a Scott carriage. 

t It is impossible to estimate the rate of fire per minute when mounted upon im- 
provised carriages. 



APPENDICES 



287 



Table B. — Boer Guns of Position. 



Gun. 



Construction 

Calibre, inches 

Total length of gun . . . 
Nominal weight of gun, 

including breech 

Muzzle veloc. ft. per sec. 
If Q. F., rate of aimed 

fire per minute 

Projectiles 

Weight of do., lbs 

Explosive in Com. Shell. 

Bullets in Shrapnel 

Max. Rge. with Com. Shi. 



24 cm. 


IS cm. 


12 cm. 


12 cm. 


•si 5 


Creusot 


Creusot 


Krupp. 


Creusot 


%i^ 


Fortress 


Q. F. 


B. L. 


Gun of 


Gun* 


" Long " 

Gun of 

Position t 


Howitzer^ 


Position 


-n 


Coiled Steel 


Steel 


Steel 


Steel 


.r-.-^^ 


9-45. 


5-9 


4.72 


4.72 


ot; 


263.3 in. 


IS3-S 


45 in. 


122.8 


^11 


13.78 tons 


2.71 tons 


8.8 cwt. 


1.37 tons 


1,732 


1,879 


? 


1,706 


x^^ 


_ 


8 


_ 


_, 


S-^^ 


Common 


Common 


Common 


Common 


Also a go mm. 
ig 10.4 cwt.), we 
elocity, i, 508 ft. 
mailable. 


Shell 


Shell 


Shell 


Shell 




Shrapnel 


Shrapnel 


Shrapnel 


346 
Melinite 

17,500 


Melinite 

? 
11,537 § 


44 

Powder 

460 

6,342 


Melinite 

? 
11,000 § 



* Fortunately, there appears to be some doubt whether these formidable pieces, in- 
tended for the forts at Pretoria, have ever reached here. 

+ The travelling carriages for these guns are very light and simple. They are espe- 
cially adapted to defend entrenchmer. s, or, in fact, for any purpose which requires a 
frequent change of position. 

% The South African Republic possesses only one or two of these howitzers. 

§ With the elevation of 35 degrees. 



Table C. — British Field Guns. 



Gun 

Construction 

Calibre, inches 

Total length of Gun 

inches 

Nominal weight of guUj 

including breech 

Muzzle velocity, feet per 

second 

If Q. F., rate of aimed 

fire per minute 

Projectiles 

Weight of ditto, lbs 

Explosive in Common 

Shell 

Bullets in Shrapnel 

Max. Range with Com- 
mon Shell, yards 



Horse 
Batteries. 


Field 
Batteries. 


Howitzer 
Batteries. 


i2-pr.B.L. 
Wire- 


■'SeS-^^- 


5 in. B. L. 

Steel 


3 


3 


5 


66.75 


92.35 


49 


6 cwt. 


7 cwt. 


gVz cwt. 


1,553 


1,574 


782 


Shrapnel 


6to8t 

Shrapnel, 

Case 


Com. Shell 
Shrapnel 


12.5 


15 


50 


162 


210 


Lyddite 
372 


4,500 


5,500 


4.900 



Mountain 
Batteries. 



7-p. R. M. L. 

Steel Jointed. 

2.5 

70.45 

400 lbs. 

1,440 



Ring Shell, 

Shrapnel, 

Star Shell 

75< 

Black 

Powder 



3,185 



Naval 
Brigade.* 

i2-p. Q.F.B.L. 
Steel 
3 

87.6 

8 cwt. 

1,607 



Common 
Shell 



12.S 
Powder 



6,000 



* These Field Guns carried by our warships are available, but have not yet been 
utilised. t With Sir G. Clarke's " spade " apparatus. 



288 



APPENDICES 



Table D. — Boer Field Guns. 





Quick Firing Guns. 






i4J^pr. 

Creusot, 

Model, 1895 

Nickel Steel 

2.96 

98 

6K cwt. 
1,837 

8toio 
Shrapnel 

14.S 

234 

8,700 + 


75 cm. 

Maxim- 

Nordenfeldt 

Steel 

6 cwt. 
I, 640 

10 
Common 

Shell 
Shrapnel 

13K 

Melinite 

250 

6,000 


* 37 mm. 
Maxim 

Steel 
1.45 
73-75 

4 cwt. 
1,800 

300 

Small 

Explosive 

Shell 

lib 

Powder 

4,000 


75 mm. 




Krupp B. L. 
Field Gun. 
Nickel Steel 


r'alihrp inrhp<5 


2.96 


Total length of gun, in . . 
Nominal weight of gun, 

including breech, cwt. . 
Muzzle vel., ft. per sec. 
If Q. F., rate of aimed 

fire per minute 

Prniprtilp<? 


70.8 

SJ^ cwt. 
1,476 

Common 


Weight of do , lb 

Explosive in Com. Shell 

Bullets in Shrapnel 

Max. Range with Com- 
mon Shell, yards 


Shell 

Shrapnel 

12 

Black Powder 

250 

5,000 



Also some 2.5 in. R. M. L. Mountain Guns (see Table C), and 12-pr. B. L. Field 
Guns (see Table E), all purchased in this conntryczrra 1894., 

* Nicknamed bv our troops the " Pom-Poms." The British Government has now 
purchased some of these. t With the elevation of 20 degrees. 

Table E.— British Field Guns (V >lunteer Contingents *). 





Hon. ArtU- 
lery Co. 


South African Local Corps. 


Gun • • ,,•••...• 


Vick.-Max. 

Steel and 

Wire 

3 

75-5 

5-5 cwt. 
1,720 

14 to 18 t 

Shrapnel 

Case shot 

12.5 

162 
6,500 


12-pr. 

B.L. 

Mark I. 

Steel 

3 

92.35 

7 cwt. 
1,574 

Common 
Shell 

Shrapnel 
Case 
12.S 

Powder 
177 

4,500 


Wrought 
Iron and 
Steel 
3 

74.5 

6 cwt. 
1,330 

Common 

Shell 
Shrapnel 

Case 
C. S. 9 lb. 

Shr. 

9 lb. 12 oz. 

Powder 

63 

4,000 


R.T-L. 
Steel 

2.94 
41 

200 lbs. 
950 

Double 1 -g 

Shell ( :§ 

Com. Shll. f 1 

Shrapnel J w 

Powder 
42 

3,000 


J"P''u 




Hotch. 

Q. F.Gun. 

Steel 


Calibre, inches 

Total length of gun, in. 
Nominal weight of gun, 

including breech 

Muzzle vel., ft. per sec. 
If Q. F., rate of aimed 

fire per minute 

Prniiartilp^ 


1.85 
80.6 

5 cwt. 
1,873 

25 


Weight of ditto, lbs.... 

Explosive in Common 
Shell 

Bullets in Shrapnel 

Maximum Range, with 
Common Shell, yards 


Common 
Shell 

3 

Powder 
4,000 



* Canadian and New South Wales Artillery Contingents are equipped with is-pf. 
Q. F.B. L. Guns, same as those scheduled in Table C, while the gun detachment u 
protected by bullet-proof shields on the carriage. 

t Eighteen shots per minute possible with case shots only. 



APPENDIX V. 

OFFICIAL TABLE OF CASUALTIES. 

The War Office has issued the following List of Casualties 
IN THE Field Force, South Africa, up to and including 
March io. 



Casualties in Action. 
Name of Engagement. 



Total casualties reported up 
to and including March 



Belmont, Nov. 23 

Colenso, Dec. 15 

Dundee, Oct. 20 

Elandslaagte, Oct. 21. 

Enslin (Graspan), Nov. 
25 

Farquhar's Farm and 
Nicholson's Nek, 
Oct. 30 

Klip Kraal, Feb. 16.... 

Maaghersfontein, Dec. 



Monte Cristo (Colen- 
so), &c., Feb. 15 to 



Modder River, Nov. 28. 

Natal, Feb. 14 to 27... 

Paardeberg, Feb. 16 to 
27 

Potgieter's Drift, Feb. 
5t07 

Rietfontein, Oct. 24. .. 

Spion Kop, &c., Jan. 
17 to 24 

Stormberg, Dec. 10 — 

Willow Grange, Nov. 

23 

At Ladysmith during in- 
vestment — 

Battle of Jan. 6 

Other casualties 

Kimberley during in- 
vestment 

At Maf eking 

Other Casualties 



At 



Total reported up to 
March 10 194 



Killed. 



O 3 



148 



Wounded. 



847 601 



?I 



647 



326 

98 

5056 
51 



Died of 

Wounds 

(Included 

in 

Wounded). 






Missing 

and 

Prisoners.* 



365 150 



6^ 



207 

306 

4 



9o6t 
7 



340 
620 



3,372t 945 



Total 

Killed, 
Wounded, 
Missing, 

and 
Prisoners. 






270 

1. 054 

430 

223 

18s 



1,191 
118 



902 



170 

461 

2,060 



.439 



,642 
702 



85 



373 
279 

127 
219 

,579 



[3,974 



19 



289 



290 



APPENDICES 



Other Casualties. 


Offi- 
cers. 


N.C.O.'s 

and Men. 


Other Casualties. 


Offi- 
cers. 


N.C.O.'s 
and Men. 


Total up to and including 






Total losses in the Field 
Force, South Africa, ex- 






March 10 — 






cluding sick and wound- 
ed men still in British 






Died of disease in 






hospitals in South Af- 
rica, up to March 10 — 






South Africa 


26 


904 


Killed in action 


194 


1,847 








Died of Wounds 


40 


365 


Accidental deaths in 






Missing and prisoners 


150 


3.372t 








Died of disease 


26 


904 


South Africa 


2 


23 


Accidental deaths 


2 


23 








Sent home as invalids 


103 


2,771 


Invalids sent home — 


l8 


986 


^otal 


515 








Wounded 




9,282 








Total losses (exclusive of 


^1 Y --i-^ 


Sick f 




i>337 










now in British hospitals 


9.797 


Not specified which.. 


41 


448 


m South Africa) 



* A complete list of prisoners has not been obtained. 

t Including missing men of Royal Irish Fusiliers, numbers not reported, but esti- 
mated at 442. 



13 



APPENDIX VI. 



GLOSSARY OF BOER TERMS AND THEIR ENGLISH 

EQUIVALENTS, SPECIALLY PREPARED BY A 

JOHANNESBURGER FOR THIS VOLUME 



Berg 
Boom 
Bosch 
Bron 
Brug 

Bult 

Burg 
Dorp 

Fontein 

Heil 

Heilbron 

Kaallaagte 

Kameel 

Kloof 
Kraal 

Kopje 

Laager 



Laagte 

Paard, or per d 
Raad 



Raadhuis 



■■ mountain. 
■■ tree. 
: bush, 
spring, 
bridge. Compare Scotch and Old English 

"brig."^ 
a smooth ride, in contradistinction to *' rand." 

A " down." 
town, borough, or burgh, 
thorp, hamlet, or village. 
spring, 
health. 

spring of health, 
bare valley, 
not camel, but giraffe. Kameelfontein is 

* ' Fountain of the Giraffes. ' ' 
a gap, cloven between two hiUs. 
a corruption of a word cognate to corral. An 

enclosure for cattle, 
peak, rather than hill. It may, however, be 

used to indicate the latter, 
a fortification made by placing waggons in a 

circle, locking their poles together, and filling 

up all gaps with thorny mimosa bushes or 

other obstructions. It is now often used 

merely to denote camp, 
valley, 
horse. 
Council, but is usually qualified by a prefix. 

Uitvoerende Raad is the Executive Council. 

Volksraad is one of the deliberative assemblies 

or parliaments, 
i House of Parliament, but not used in Pretoria, 

291 



292 



APPENDICES 



Raad 

Riem 

Riei 

Rivier 

Ronde 

Ruigte 

Sjambok 

Spruit 
Sweep 
Vaal 
Veld 

Veld-cornet 
Veldheer 



Vlei 

Volksraad 
Vrij 



Win 

Witwatersrand 

Zeekoe 



as two chambers are set apart in the Govern- 
ment Buildings there (Gouvernements Geb- 
ouwen) for the two assemblies. These cham- 
bers are each known as a " raadzaal." Com- 
pare French salle. 

means a rough ridge when describing natural 
features. 

thong of dressed leather used to couple yoked 
oxen together. 

: reed or wild cane. 

a river. 

: round. 

: scrubby copse. 

: a whip of giraffe or other tough hide — ^pro- 
nounced shambok. 

■ a small stream. 

= whip. 

: grey. Vaal Rivier is the Grey River, 
not field, as we understand it, but open country 
like the prairies. 

= Field-cornet. 

: Commander, but is not used in ordinary South 
African Dutch patois. It is good Dutch, and 
means a commander of armies. Commandant- 
General is General, then Commandant Dis- 
trict-General, then Field-cornet is a Colonel, 
or rather a combination of Colonel and Major, 
Assistant Field-cornet is a Captain. In the 
artillery the ranks run down from Colonel as 
with us. 
a marsh, it is a contraction of vallei, but it does 
not mean valley. 

: Parliament. 

■■ Free. In the English form of any word in which 
the two letters i j occur together these are 
amalgamated into y. 

: to triumph, or win, seen in Winburg. 

= Ridge of the white waters. 

= Rhinoceros, a word often used in the names of 
farms. 



APPENDIX VII. 

THE PRESIDENTS' TEIyEGRAM PROPOSING PEACE AND 
LORD SALISBURY'S REPLY. 

No. I. 

The Presidents of the Orange Free State and of the South African 
Republic to the Marquess of Salisbury.— {Received March 6.) 

Bi^oEMFONTEiN, March 5, 1900. 
The blood and the tears of the thousands who have suffered by 
this war, and the prospect of all the moral and economic ruin with 
which South Africa is now threatened, make it necessary for both 
belligerents to ask themselves, dispassionately, and as in the sight 
of the Triune God, for what they are fighting, and whether the aim 
of each justifies all this appalling misery and devastation. 

With this object, and in view of the assertions of various British 
statesmen to the effect that this war was begun and is being carried 
on with the set purpose of undermining her Majesty's authority in 
South Africa, and of setting up an Administration over all South 
Africa, independent of her Majesty's Government, we consider it 
our duty solemnly to declare that this war was undertaken solely as 
a defensive measure to safeguard the threatened independence of 
the South African Republic, and is only continued in order to secure 
and safeguard the incontestable independence of both Republics as 
sovereign international States, and to obtain the assurance that 
those of her Majesty's subjects who have taken part with us in this 
war shall suffer no harm whatsoever in person or property. 

On these conditions, but on these conditions alone, are we now, 
as in the past, desirous of seeing peace re-established in South 
Africa, and of putting an end to the evils now reigning over South 
Africa ; while, if her Majesty's Government is determined to destroy 
the independence of the Republics, there is nothing left to us and 
to our people but to persevere to the end in the course already 
begun, in spite of the overwhelming pre-eminence of the British 
Empire, confident that that God who lighted the unextinguishable 
^ 293 



^94 APPENDICES 

fire of the love of freedom in the hearts of ourselves and of our 
fathers will not forsake us, but will accomplish His work in us and 
in our descendants. 

We hesitated to make this declaration earlier to your Excellency, 
as we feared that as long as the advantage was always on our side, 
and as long as our forces held defensive positions far in her 
Majesty's Colonies, such a declaration might hurt the feelings of 
honour of the British people ; but now that the prestige of the 
British Empire may be considered to be assured by the capture of 
one of our forces by her Majesty's troops, and that we are thereby 
forced to evacuate other positions which our forces had occupied, 
that difficulty is over, and we can no longer hesitate clearly to in- 
form your Government and people in the sight of the whole civil- 
ised world why we are fighting, and on what conditions we are 
ready to restore peace. 

No. 2. 
The Marquess of Salisbury to the Presidents of the South African 
Republic and Orange Free State. 

FoR:eiGN Officb, Mafch ii, 1900. 

I have the honour to acknowledge your Honours' telegram dated 
the 5th of March from Bloemfontein, of which the purport is prin- 
cipally to demand that her Majesty's Government shall recognise 
the " incontestable independence " of the South African Republic 
and Orange Free State ' ' as sovereign international States, ' ' and to 
offer, on those terms, to bring the war to a conclusion. 

In the beginning of October last peace existed between her 
Majesty and the two Republics under the Conventions which then 
were in existence. A discussion had been proceeding for some 
months between her Majesty's Government and the South African 
Republic, of which the object was to obtain redress for certain very 
serious grievances under which British residents in the South 
African Republic were suffering. In the course of those negotia- 
tions, the South African Republic had, to the knowledge of her 
Majesty's Government, made considerable armaments, and the 
latter had, consequently, taken steps to provide corresponding 
reinforcements to the British garrisons of CapetoMm and Natal. 
No infringements of the rights guaranteed by the Conventions had, 
up to that point, taken place on the British side. 

Suddenly, at two days' notice, the South African Republic, after 



APPENDICES 295 

issuing an insulting ultimatum, declared war upon her Majesty ; 
and the Orange Free State, with whom there had not even been 
any discussion, took a similar step. Her Majesty's dominions were 
immediately invaded by the two Republics, siege was laid to three 
towns within the British frontier, a large portion of the two 
Colonies was overrun, with great destruction to property and lif e- 
and the Republics claimed to treat the inhabitants of extensive por- 
tions of her Majesty's dominions as if those dominions had been 
annexed to one or other of them. In anticipation of these opera- 
tions the South African Republic had been accumulating for many 
years past military stores on an enormous scale, which, by their 
character, could only have been intended for use against Great 
Britain, 

Your Honours make some observations of a negative character 
upon the object with which these preparations were made. I do 
not think it necessary to discuss the questions you have raised. 
But the result of these preparations, carried on with great secrecy, 
has been that the British Empire has been compelled to confront 
an invasion which has entailed upon the Empire a costly war and 
the loss of thousands of precious lives. This great calamity has 
been the penalty which Great Britain has suffered for having in 
recent years acquiesced in the existence of the two Republics. 

In view of the use to which the two Republics have put the posi- 
tion which was given to them, and the calamities which their un- 
provoked attack has inflicted upon her Majesty's dominions, her 
Majesty's Government can only answer your Honours' telegram by 
sa5ring that they are not prepared to assent to the independence 
either of the South African Republic or of the Orange Free State. 



APPENDIX VIII. 

THE TWO CONVENTIONS. 

Convention of i88i. 

Her Majesty's Commissioners for the settlement of the Trans- 
vaal Territory duly appointed as such by a Commission passed 
under the Royal Sign Manual and Signet bearing date the 5th of 
April, 1881, do hereby undertake and guarantee on behalf of Her 
Majesty that from and after the 8th day of August, 1881, complete 
self-government, subject to the suzerainty of Her Majesty, her 
heirs and successors, will be accorded to the inhabitants of the 
Transvaal Territory, upon the following terms and conditions, and 
subject to the following reservations and limitations : — 

ArTicIvE I. — The said Territory, to be hereinafter called the 
Transvaal State, will embrace the land lying between the follow- 
ing boundaries, to wit : 

(^Here follows a long description of landmarks, boundaries, &e.) 

ArTicIvE 2. — Her Majesty reserves to herself, her heirs and 
successors {a) the right from time to time to appoint a British 
Resident in and for the said State, with such duties and functions 
as are hereinafter defined ; (5) the right to move troops through the 
said State in time of war, or in case of the apprehension of im- 
mediate war, between the Suzerain Power and any foreign State 
or native tribe in South Africa ; and (c) the control of the external 
relations of the said State, including the conclusion of treaties and 
the conduct of diplomatic intercourse with foreign powers, such 
intercourse to be carried on through Her Majesty's diplomatic and 
consular officers abroad. 

Artici^E 3. — Until altered by the Volksraad, or other competent 

authority, all laws, whether passed before or after the annexation 

of the Transvaal to Her Majesty's dominions, shall, except in so 

far as they are inconsistent with or repugnant to the provisions of 

296 



APPENDICES 297 

this Convention, be and remain in force in the said State in so far 
as they shall be applicable thereto : Provided that no further en- 
actment specially affecting the interests of natives shall have any 
force or effect in the said State without the consent of Her 
Majesty, her heirs and successors, first had and obtained and sig- 
nified to the Government of the said State through the British 
Resident. Provided further that in no case will the repeal or 
amendment of any laws which have been enacted since the admin- 
istration have a retrospective effect so as to invalidate any acts 
done or liabilities incurred by virtue of such laws. 

ART1CI.E 4.— On the 8th day of August, 1881, the Government 
of the said State together with all rights and obligations thereto 
appertaining, and all the State property taken over at the time of 
annexation, save and except munitions of war will be handed 
over to 

Messrs. Stephanus Johannes Paulus Kriiger, 
Martinus Wessel Pretorius, and 
Petrus Jacobus Joubert, 

or the survivor or survivors of them, who will forthwith cause a 
Volksraad to be elected and convened, and the Volksraad thus 
elected and convened will decide as to the further administration 
of the Government of the said State. 

ARTICI.E 5. — All sentences passed upon persons who may be con- 
victed of offences contrary to the rules of civilised warfare, com- 
mitted during the recent hostilities, will be duly carried out, and 
no alteration or mitigation of such sentences will be made or 
allowed by the Government of the Transvaal State without Her 
Majesty's consent, conveyed through the British Resident. In 
case there shall be any prisoners in any of the gaols of the Trans- 
vaal State whose respective sentences of imprisonment have been 
remitted in part by Her Majesty's administrator or other officer 
administering the Government, such remission will be recognised 
and acted upon by the future Government of the said State. 

Article 6. — Her Majesty's Government will make due compen- 
sation for all losses or damage sustained by reason of such acts as 
are in the Eighth Article hereinafter specified which may have 
been committed by Her Majesty's forces during the recent hostili- 
ties, except for such losses or damage as may already have been 
compensated for, and the Government of the Transvaal State will 



298 APPENDICES 

make due compensation for all loss or damage sustained by reason 
of such acts as are in the Eighth Article hereinafter specified, 
which may have been committed by the people who were in arms 
against Her Majesty during the recent hostilities, except for such 
losses or damage as may already have been compensated for. 

ArTici<b^ 7. — The decision of all claims for compensation, as in 
the last preceding article mentioned, will be referred to a Sub- 
Commission consisting of the Honourable George Hudson, the 
Honourable Jacobus Petrus de Wet, and the Honourable John 
Gilbert Kotze. 

In case one or more of such Sub-Commissioners shall be unable 
or unwilling to act the remaining Sub-Commissioner or Sub-Com- 
missioners will, after consultation with the Government of the 
Transvaal State, submit for the approval of Her Majesty's High 
Commissioner the names of one or more persons to be appointed 
by him to fill the place or places thus vacated. 

The decision of the said Sub-Commissioner or a majority of 
them will be final. 

The said Sub-Commissioners will enter upon and perform 
their duties with all convenient speed. They will before taking 
evidence or ordering evidence to be taken in respect of any claim 
decide whether any such claim can be entertained at all under the 
rules contained in the next succeeding article. In regard to claims 
which can be so entertained the Sub-Commissioners will in the first 
instance afford every facility for an amicable arrangement as to the 
amount payable in respect to any claim, and only in cases in which 
there is no reasonable ground for believing that an immediate 
amicable arrangement can be arrived at will they take evidence or 
order evidence to be taken. 

For the purpose of taking evidence and reporting thereon the 
Sub-Commissioners may appoint deputies who will without delay 
submit records of the evidence and their reports to the Sub-Com- 
missioners. The Sub-Commissioners will arrange their sittings and 
the sittings of their deputies in such a manner as to afford the 
greatest convenience to the parties concerned and their witnesses. 
In no case will costs be allowed to either side other than the 
actual and reasonable expenses of witnesses whose evidence is 
certified by the Sub-Commissioners to have been necessary. In- 
terest will not run on the amount of any claim except as herein- 
after provided for. 



APPENDICES 299 

The said Sub-Commissioners will forthwith after deciding upon 
any claim announce their decision to the Government against 
which the award is made and to the claimant. 

The amount of remuneration payable to the Sub-Commissioners 
and their deputies will be determined by the High Commissioner 
after all the claims have been decided upon. The British Govern- 
ment and the Government of the Transvaal State will pay propor- 
tionate shares of such remuneration and of the expenses of the 
Sub-Commissioners and their deputies according to the amounts 
awarded against them respectively. 

ArTicIvB 8. — For the purpose of distinguishing claims to be 
accepted from those to be rejected the Sub-Commissioners will be 
guided by the following rules, viz. : Compensation will be allowed 
for losses or damage sustained by reason of the following acts 
committed during the recent hostilities, viz. : (a) Commandeer- 
ing, seizure, confiscation, or destruction of property or damage 
done to property ; {d) violence done or threats used by persons 
in arms. 

In regard to acts under (a) compensation will be allowed for 
direct losses only. 

In regard to acts falling under (d) compensation will be allowed 
for actual losses of property or actual injury to the same, proved 
to have been caused by its enforced abandonment. 

No claims for indirect losses, except such as are in this article 
specially provided for, will be entertained. 

No claims which have been handed in to the secretary of the 
Royal Commission after the first day of July, 1881, will be enter- 
tained unless the Sub-Commissioner shall be satisfied that the 
delay was reasonable. 

When claims for loss of property are considered the Sub-Com- 
missioners will require distinct proof of the existence of the 
property and that it neither has reverted nor will revert to the 
claimant. 

Ar'Tici.e; 9. — The Government of the Transvaal State will pay 
and satisfy the amount of every claim awarded against it within 
one month after the Sub-Commissioners shall have notified their 
decision to the said Government, and in default of such payment 
the said Government will pay interest at the rate of 6 per cent, 
per annum from the date of such default ; but Her Majesty's 
Government may at any time before such payment pay th§ 



300 APPENDICES \ 

amount with interest, if any, to the claimant in satisfaction of his 
claim, and may add the sum thus paid to any debt which may be 
due by the Transvaal State to Her Majesty's Government as 
hereinafter provided for. 

ArTici<E io. — The Transvaal State vsdll be liable for the balance 
of the debts for which the South African Republic was liable at 
the date of annexation, to wit : the sum of ^48,000 in respect of 
the Cape Commercial Bank Loan and ;^85,667 in respect of the 
railway loan, together with the amount due on the 8th of August, 
1881, on account of the Orphan Chamber debt, which now stands 
at ^27,226 15s., which debts will be a first charge upon the 
revenues of the State. The Transvaal State will, moreover, be 
liable for the lawful expenditure lawfully incurred for the neces- 
sary expenses of the province since annexation, to wit : the 
sum of ;^265,ooo, which debt, together with such debts as may 
be incurred by virtue of the Ninth Article, will be a second charge 
upon the revenues of the State. 

Article ii. — The debts due as aforesaid by the Transvaal State 
to Her Majesty's Government will bear interest at the rate of 3^ 
per cent. ; and any portion of such debt as may remain unpaid on 
the 8th of August, 1882, shall be repayable by a payment for in- 
terest and sinking fund of /6 os. 9d. per ;^ioo per annum, which 
will extinguish the debt in twenty-five years. The said payment 
of ;^6 OS. 9d. per ^100 shall be payable half-yearly in British cur- 
rency on the 8th of February and the 8th of August in each year. 
Provided always that the Transvaal State shall pay in reduction of 
the said debt the sum of /ioo,ooo before the 8th of August, 1882, 
and shall be at liberty at the close of any half-year to pay off the 
whole or any portion of the outstanding debt. 

ART1CI.K 12. — All persons holding property in the said State on 
the 8th day of August, 188 1, will continue to enjoy the rights of 
property which they have enjoyed since the annexation. No 
person who has remained loyal to Her Majesty during the recent 
hostilities shall suffer any molestation by reason of his loyalty or 
be liable to any criminal prosecution or civil Action for any part 
taken in connection with such hostilities, and all such persons 
will have full liberty to reside in the country with enjoyment of 
all civil rights and protection for their persons and property. 

Article 13. — Natives will be allowed to acquire land, but the 
grant or transfer of such land will in every case be made to and 



APPENDICES 301 

registered in the name of the Native Ivocation Commission herein- 
after mentioned in trust for such natives. 

ArTici,:^ 14. — Natives will be allowed to move as freely within 
the country as may be consistent with the requirements of public 
order, and to leave it for the purpose of seeking employment else- 
where or for other lawful purposes, subject always to the Pass 
Laws of the said State, as amended by the Legislature of the 
province, or as may hereafter be enacted under the provisions of 
the Third Article of this Convention. 

Article 15. — ^The provisions of the Fourth Article of the Sand 
River Convention are hereby reaffirmed, and no slavery or ap- 
prenticeship partaking of slavery will be tolerated by the Govern- 
ment of the said State. 

ArTici<B 16.— There will continue to be complete freedom of 
religion and protection from molestation for all denominations, 
provided the same be not inconsistent with morality and good 
order ; and no disability shall attach to any person in regard to 
rights of property by reason of the religious opinions which he 
holds. 

ArticIvB 17. — The British Resident will receive from the Gov- 
ernment of the Transvaal State such assistance and support as can 
by law be given for the due discharge of his functions. He will 
also receive every assistance for the proper care and preservation 
of the graves of such of Her Majesty's Forces as have died in the 
Transvaal, and if need be, for the expropriation of land for the 
purpose. 

ArTici^E 18. — The following will be the duties and functions of 
the British Resident : — 

1. He will perform duties and functions analogous to those dis- 
charged by a Chargi d' Affaires and Consul-General. 

2. In regard to the natives within the Transvaal State he will 
{a) report to the High Commissioner, as representative of the 
Suzerain, as to the working and observance of the provisions of 
this Convention ; {b) report to the Transvaal authorities any cases 
of ill-treatment of natives, or attempts to incite natives to re- 
bellion, that may come to his knowledge ; {c) use his influence 
with the natives in favour of law and order ; and {d) generally 
perform such other duties as are by this Convention entrusted to 
him, and take such steps for the protection of persons and prop- 
erty of natives as are consistent vnth the law of the laud. 



302 APPENDICES 

3. In regard to natives not residing in the Transvaal (a) he will 
report to the High Commissioner and the Transvaal Government 
any encroachments reported to him as having been made by 
Transvaal residents upon the land of any such natives, and in 
case of disagreement between the Transvaal Government and the 
British Resident as to whether an encroachment has been made, 
the decision of the Suzerain will be final ; (d) the British Resi- 
dent will be the medium of communication with native chiefs 
outside the Transvaal, and, subject to the approval of the High 
Commissioner as representing the Suzerain, he will control the 
conclusion of treaties with them ; and (c) he will arbitrate upon 
every dispute between the Transvaal residents and natives out- 
side the Transvaal (as to acts committed beyond the boundaries 
of the Transvaal) which may be referred to him by the parties 
interested. 

4. In regard to communication with foreign Powers the 
Transvaal Government will correspond with Her Majesty's 
Government through the British Resident and the High Com- 
missioner. 

ArTici^E 19. — The Government of the Transvaal State will 
strictly adhere to the boundaries defined in the first Article of 
this Convention, and will do its utmost to prevent any of its 
inhabitants from making any encroachment upon lands beyond 
the said State. The Royal Commission will forthwith appoint a 
person who will beacon off the boundary line between Ramat- 
labama and the point where such line first touches the Griqua- 
land West boundary, midway between the Vaal and Hart Rivers. 
The person so appointed will be instructed to make an arrange- 
ment between the owners of the farms " Grootfontein " and 
" Valleif ontein, " on the one hand, and the Barolong authorities 
on the other, by which a fair share of the water supply of the 
said farms shall be allowed to flow undisturbed to the said 
Barolongs. 

ArTicIvE 20. — All grants or titles issued at any time by the 
Transvaal Government in respect of land outside the boundary of 
the Transvaal State, as defined in Article i, shall be considered 
invalid and of no effect except in so far as any such grant or 
title relates to land that falls within the boundary of the Trans- 
vaal State ; and all persons holding any such grant so considered 
invalid and of no effect, will receive from the Government of 



APPENDICES 303 

the Transvaal State such compensation either in land or in 
money as the Volksraad shall determine. In all cases in which 
any native chiefs or other authorities outside the said boundaries 
have received any adequate consideration from the Government 
of the former South African Repubhc, for land excluded from the 
Transvaal by the first Article of this Convention, or where perma- 
nent improvements have been made on the land, the British 
Resident will, subject to the approval of the High Commissioner, 
use his influence to recover from the native authorities fair com- 
pensation for the loss of the land thus excluded or of the perma- 
nent improvements thereon. 

ARTICI.E 21. — Forthwith after the taking effect of this Con- 
vention, a Native Location Commission will be constituted, 
consisting of the President (or in his absence the Vice-President) 
of the State, or some one deputed by him, the Resident, or some 
one deputed by him, and a third person to be agreed upon by the 
President (or Vice-President as the case may be) and the Resi- 
dent ; and such Commission will be a standing body for the per- 
formance of the duties hereinafter mentioned. 

ArTici,E 22. — The Native I^ocation Commission will reserve to 
the native tribes of the State such locations as they may be fairly 
and equitably entitled to, due regard being had to the actual 
occupation of such tribes. The Native Location Commission will 
clearly define the boundaries of such locations, and for that pur- 
pose will in every instance first of all ascertain the wishes of the 
parties interested in such land. In case land already granted in 
individual titles shall be required for the purpose of any location 
the owners will receive such compensation either in other land or 
in money as the Volksraad shall determine. After the boundaries 
of any location have been fixed, no fresh grant of land within 
such location will be made nor will the boundaries be altered 
without the consent of the lyocation Commission. No fresh grants 
of land will be made in the districts of Waterberg, Zoutpansberg, 
and Lydenburg until the locations in the said districts respectively 
shall have been defined by the said Commission. 

ARTICI.B 23, — If not released before the taking effect of this 
Convention, Sikukuni and those of his followers who have been 
imprisoned with him will be forthwith released, and the bound- 
aries of his location will be defined by the Native Location 
Commission in the same manner indicated in the last preceding 
Article, 



304 



APPENDICES 



ArTicI/E 24. — The independence of the Swazis within the 
boundary line of Swaziland as indicated in the first Article of this 
Convention will be fully recognised. 

ArTicIvE; 25. — No other or higher duties will be imposed on the 
importation into the Transvaal State of any article the produce or 
manufacture of the dominions and possessions of Her Majesty, 
from whatever place arriving, than are or may be payable on the 
like article, the produce or manufacture of any other country, 
nor will any prohibition be maintained or imposed on the impor- 
tation of any article of produce or manufacture of the dominions 
and possessions of Her Majesty, which shall not equally extend 
to the importation of the like articles being the produce or 
manufacture of any other country. 

Artici^e; 26. — All persons, other than natives, conforming to 
the laws of the Transvaal State, (a) will have full liberty, with 
their families, to enter, travel, or reside in any part of the Trans- 
vaal State ; (d) they will be entitled to hire or possess houses, 
manufactories, warehouses, shops, and premises ; (c) they may 
carry on their commerce either in person or by any agents 
whom they may think fit to employ ; {d) they will not be subject 
in respect to their persons or property, or in respect of their 
commerce or industry, to any taxes whether general or local other 
than those which are or may be imposed on Transvaal citizens. 

ArticIvB 27. — All inhabitants of the Transvaal shall have free 
access to the Courts of Justice for the prosecution and defence of 
their rights. 

Artici^E) 28. — All persons, other than natives, who established 
their domicile in the Transvaal between the 12th day of April, 
1877, and the date when this Convention comes into effect, and 
who shall within twelve months after such last-mentioned date 
have their names registered by the British Resident, shall be ex- 
empt from all compulsory military service whatever. The Resident 
shall notify such registration to the Government of the Transvaal 
State. 

Artici^B 29. — Provision shall hereafter be made by a separate 
instrument for the mutual extradition of criminals, and also for 
the surrender of deserters from Her Majesty's forces. 

ArTici^B 30. — All debts contracted since the annexation will be 
payable in the same currency in which they may have been con- 
tracted. All uncancelled postage and other revenue stamps issued 



APPENDICES 305 

by the Government since the annexation will remain valid, and 
will be accepted at their present value by the future Government 
of the State. All licences duly issued since the annexation will 
remain in force for the period for which they may have been issued. 

ArTici^E 31. — No grants of land which may have been made, 
and no transfers or mortgages which may have been passed since 
the day of annexation, will be invalidated by reason merely of 
their having been made or passed after such date. All transfers to 
the British Secretary for Native Affairs in trust for natives will 
remain in force, the Native Location Commission taking the place 
of such Secretary for Native Affairs. 

ARTICI.B 32. — This Convention will be ratified by a newly elected 
Volksraad within the period of three months after its execution, 
and in default of such ratification this Convention shall be null 
and void. 

ArTici^e 33. — Forthwith after the ratification of this Convention, 
as in the last preceding article mentioned, all British troops in 
Transvaal territory will leave the same, and the mutual delivery 
of munitions of war will be carried out. 

Signed at Pretoria this third day of August, 1881. 

HercuIvES Robinson, President and High 

Commissioner. 
EvEi^YN Wood, Major-General, Officer 

Adm,inistering the Government. 
J. H. DE VlLUERS. 

We, the undersigned, Stephanus Johannes Paulus Kriiger, 
Martinus Wessel Pretorius, and Petrus Jacobus Joubert, as repre- 
sentatives of the Transvaal burghers, do hereby agree to all the 
above conditions, reservations, and limitations under which self- 
government has been restored to the inhabitants of the Transvaal 
territory, subject to the suzerainty of Her Majesty, her heirs and 
successors, and we agree to accept the Government of the said ter- 
ritory, with all the rights and obligations thereto appertaining, on 
the 8th day of August, 1881, and we promise and undertake that 
this Convention shall be ratified by a newly elected Volksraad of 
the Transvaal State within three months from this date. 

Signed at Pretoria this 3rd day of August, 1881. 

S. J. P. Kruger, 
M. W. Pretorius, 
P. J. Joubert, 
30 



Royal Commissioners^ 



3o6 APPENDICES 



Convention of 1884. 

Whereas the Government of the Transvaal State, through its 
Delegates, consisting of Stephanus Johannes Paulus Kriiger, 
President of the said" State, Stephanus Jacobus Du Toit, Superin- 
tendent of Education, and Nicholas Jacobus Smit, a member of 
the Volksraad, have represented that the Convention signed at 
Pretoria on the 3rd day of August, 1881, and ratified by the Volks- 
raad of the said State on the 25th October, 1881, contains certain 
provisions which are inconvenient, and imposes burdens and 
obligations from which the said State is desirous to be relieved, 
and that the south-western boundaries fixed by the said Conven- 
tion should be amended, with a view to promote the peace and 
good order of the said State, and of the countries adjacent thereto ; 
and whereas Her Majesty the Queen of the United Kingdom of 
Great Britain and Ireland has been pleased to take the said repre- 
sentations into consideration : Now, therefore. Her Majesty has 
been pleased to direct, and it is hereby declared, that the following 
articles of a new Convention, signed on behalf of Her Majesty by 
Her Majesty's High Commissioner in South Africa, the Right 
Honourable Sir Hercules George Robert Robinson, Knight Grand 
Cross of the Most Distinguished Order of Saint Michael and Saint 
George, Governor of the Colony of the Cape of Good Hope, and 
on behalf of the Transvaal State (which shall hereinafter be called 
the South African Republic) by the above-named Delegates, 
Stephanus Johannes Paulus Kriiger, Stephanus Jacobus Du Toit, 
and Nicholas Jacobus Smit, shall, when ratified by the Volksraad 
of the South African Republic, be substituted for the articles em- 
bodied in the Convention of 3rd August, 1881 ; which latter, pend- 
ing such ratification, shall continue in full force and effect. 

ArTicIvE 2.— The Government of the South African Republic will 
strictly adhere to the boundaries defined in the first Article of this 
Convention, and will do its utmost to prevent any of its inhabitants 
from making any encroachments upon lands beyond the said 
boundaries. The Government of the South African Republic will 
appoint Commissioners upon the eastern and western borders 
whose duty it will be strictly to guard against irregularities and all 
trespassing over the boundaries. Her Majesty's Government will, 
if necessary, appoint Commissioners in the native territories out- 



APPENDICES 307 

side the eastern and western borders of the South African Republic 
to maintain order and prevent encroachment. 

Her Majesty's Government and the Government of the South 
African Republic will each appoint a person to proceed together to 
beacon off the amended south-west boundary as described in Article 
I of this Convention ; and the President of the Orange Free State 
shall be requested to appoint a referee, to whom the said persons 
shall refer any questions on which they may disagree respecting 
the interpretation of the said Article, and the decision of such 
referee thereon shall be final. The arrangement already made, 
under the terms of Article 19 of the Convention of Pretoria of the 
3rd August, 1881, between the owners of the farms Grootfontein 
and Valleifontein on the one hand, and the Barolong authorities 
on the other, by which a fair share of the water supply of the said 
farms shall be allowed to flow undisturbed to the said Barolongs, 
shall continue in force, 

ArTicIvK 3. — If a British officer is appointed to reside at Pretoria 
or elsewhere within the South African Republic to discharge func- 
tions analogous to those of a Consular officer he will receive the 
protection and assistance of the Republic. 

ArTici^B 4.— The South African Republic will conclude no 
treaty or engagement with any State or nation other than the 
Orange Free State, nor with any native tribe to the eastward or 
westward of the Republic, until the same has been approved by 
Her Majesty the Queen. 

Such approval shall be considered to have been granted if Her 
Majesty's Government shall not, within six months after receiving 
a copy of such treaty (which shall be delivered to them imme- 
diately upon its completion), have notified that the conclusion of 
such treaty is in conflict with the interests of Great Britain or of 
any of Her Majesty's possessions in South Africa. 

ArTici^K 5. — The South African Republic will be liable for any 
balance which may still remain due of the debts for which it was 
liable at the date of annexation, to wit: the Cape Commercial Bank 
lyoan, the Railway Loan, and the Orphan Chamber Debt, which 
debts will be a first charge upon the revenues of the Republic. 
The South African Republic will, moreover, be liable to Her 
Majesty's Government for ^250,000, which will be a second charge 
upon the revenues of the Republic. 

ArTici^K 6.— The debt due as aforesaid by the South African 



3o8 APPENDICES 

Republic to Her Majesty's Government will bear interest at the 
rate of 2,}4 per cent., from the date of the ratification of this Con- 
vention, and shall be repayable by a pajmient for interest and 
Sinking Fund of ^6 os. ^d. per ^loo per annum, which will ex- 
tinguish the debt in twenty-five years. The said payment of 
;^6 OS. 9d. per ^loo shall be payable half-yearly, in British cur- 
rency, at the close of each half-year from the date of such ratifica- 
tion : Provided always that the South African Republic shall be at 
liberty at the close of any half-year to pay off the whole or any 
portion of the outstanding debt. 

Interest at the rate of 2>H P^r cent, on the debt standing under 
the Convention of Pretoria shall as heretofore be paid to the date 
of the ratification of this Convention. 

ArTici,B 7. — All persons who held property in the Transvaal 
on the 8th day of August, 1881, and still hold the same, will con- 
tinue to enjoy the rights of property which they have enjoyed 
since the 12th April, 1877. No person who has remained loyal to 
Her Majesty during the late hostilities shall suffer any molestation 
by reason of his loyalty ; or be liable to any criminal prosecution 
or civil action for any part taken in connection with such hostili- 
ties ; and all such persons will have full liberty to reside in the 
country, with enjoyment of all civil rights, and protection for their 
persons and property. 

ArTici,:^ 8. — The South African Republic renews the declaration 
made in the Sand River Convention, and in the Convention of 
Pretoria, that no slavery or apprenticeship partaking of slavery 
will be tolerated by the Government of the said Republic. 

ArTici^K 9. — ^There will continue to be complete freedom of 
religion and protection from molestation for all denominations, 
provided the same be not inconsistent with morality and good 
order ; and no disability shall attach to any person in regard to 
rights of property by reason of the religious opinions which he 
holds. 

ArTici^E 10. — The British Officer appointed to reside in the 
South African Republic will receive every assistance from the Gov- 
ernment of the said Republic in making due provision for the 
proper care and preservation of the graves of such of Her Majesty's 
Forces as have died in the Transvaal ; and, if need be, for the ap- 
propriation of land for the purpose. 

ArTICI.^ II. — All grants or titles issued at any time by the 



APPENDICES 309 

Transvaal Government in respect of land outside the boundary of 
the South African Republic, as defined in Article i, shall be consid- 
ered invalid and of no effect, except in so far as any such grant 
or title relates to land that falls within the boundary of the South 
African Republic ; and all persons holding any such grant so con- 
sidered invalid and of no effect will receive from the Government 
of the South African Republic such compensation, either in land 
or in money, as the Volksraad shall determine. In all cases in 
which any Native Chiefs or other authorities outside the said 
boundaries have received any adequate consideration from the 
Government of the South African Republic for land excluded from 
the Transvaal by the first Article of this Convention, or where per- 
manent improvements have been made on the land, the High Com- 
missioner will recover from the native authorities fair compensation 
for the loss of the land thus excluded, or of the permanent im- 
provements thereon. 

ArTICI^K 12. — The independence of the Swazis, within the 
boundary line of Swaziland, as indicated in the first Article of this 
Convention, will be fully recognised. 

ArTici,K 13. — Except in pursuance of any treaty or engagement 
made as provided in Article 4 of this Convention, no other or 
higher duties shall be imposed on the importation into the South 
African Republic of any article coming from any part of Her 
Majesty's dominions than are or may be imposed on the like 
article coming from any other place or country ; nor will any pro- 
hibition be maintained or imposed on the importation into the 
South African Republic of any article coming from any part of 
Her Majesty's dominions which shall not equally extend to the 
like article coming from any other place or country. And in like 
manner the same treatment shall be given to any article coming 
to Great Britain from the South African Republic as to the like 
article coming from any other place or country. 

These provisions do not preclude the consideration of special 
arrangements as to import duties and commercial relations between 
the South African Republic and any of Her Majesty's colonies or 
possessions. 

ArticIvK 14. — All persons, other than natives, conforming them- 
selves to the laws of the South African Republic (a) will have full 
liberty, with their families, to enter, travel, or reside in any part 
of the South African Republic ; (d) they will be entitled to hire or 



310 APPENDICES 

possess houses, manufactories, warehouses, shops, and premises ; 
{c) they may carry on their commerce either in person or by any 
agents whom they may think fit to employ ; {d) they will not be 
subject, in respect of their persons or property, or in respect of 
their commerce or industry, to any taxes, whether general or local, 
other than those which are or may be imposed upon citizens of the 
said Republic. 

ArTici^E 15. — All persons, other than natives, who established 
their domicile in the Transvaal between the 12th day of April, 
1877, and the 8th August, 1881, and who within twelve months 
after such last-mentioned date have had their names registered by 
the British Resident, shall be exempt from all compulsory military 
service whatever. 

ARTICI.K 16. — Provision shall hereafter be made by a separate 
instrument for the mutual extradition of criminals, and also for 
the surrender of deserters from Her Majesty's Forces. 

ArticIvE 17. — All debts contracted between the 12th April, 1877, 
and the 8th August, 1881, will be payable in the same currency 
in which they may have been contracted. 

ArTicIvE 18. — No grants of land which may have been made, 
and no transfers or mortgages which may have been passed 
between the 12th April, 1877, and the 8th August, 1881, will be 
invalidated by reason merely of their having been made or passed 
between such dates. 

All transfers to the British Secretary for Native Affairs in trust 
for natives will remain in force, an officer of the South African 
Republic taking the place of such Secretary for the Native 
Affairs. 

ArticIvK 19. — The Government of the South African Republic 
will engage faithfully to fulfil the assurances given, in accordance 
with the laws of the South African Republic, to the natives at the 
Pretoria Pitso by the Royal Commission in the presence of the 
Triumvirate, and with their entire assent (i) as to the freedom of 
the natives to buy or otherwise acquire land under certain con- 
ditions ; (2) as to the appointment of a commission to mark out 
native locations ; (3) as to the access of the natives to the courts 
of law ; and (4) as to their being allowed to move freely within 
the country, or to leave it for any legal purpose, under a pass 
system. 

ArTici^B 20. — This Convention will be ratified by a Volksraad 



APPENDICES 311 

of the South African Republic within the period of six months 
after its execution, and in default of such ratification this Conven- 
tion shall be null and void. 

Signed in duplicate in London this 27th day of February, 1884. 

(Signed) HERCULES ROBINSON. 

(Signed) S. J. P. KRUGER. 

(Signed) S. J. DU TOIT. 

(Signed) M. J. SMIT. 



APPENDIX IX. 

I^ORD METHUEN'S REPORT ON THE BATTl^E Olf 

M AAGHKRSFONTEIN . 

The following summary of lyord Methuen's despatch, from the 
pages of the Daily Telegraph of March 17th, should be read in 
connection with the Chapter on the Battle of Maaghersfontein : — 

In a despatch dated February 15th, Lord Methuen describes the 
action of Maaghersfontein, or Majesfontein. I|e explains that the 
enemy had intrenched a very strong position running north-west, 
and including a three-mile long kopje on the north. 

" So long as this kopje, named Majesfontein, remained in posses- 
sion of the enemy, I did not feel justified with my small force in 
marching up the Modder River, for my line of communication 
would have been in danger, and my transport could only carry 
five days' provisions. Had I marched round by Jacobsdal to 
Brown's Drift, I should have had to fight my way across the river 
in the face of a mobile force consisting of 16,000 men." 

Lord Methuen hoped to crush the enemy at one blow by attack- 
ing the Maaghersfontein Kopje, and for two hours on December 
loth the kopje was bombarded with all the guns, including the 
naval 47 inch. The General describes in detail his anticipation 
that great destruction would be done, especially by lyddite, and 
ordered the Highland Brigade, supported by all the guns, and 
with their right and rear protected by the Guards' Brigade, to 
assault the southern end of the kopje, consisting of a high hill, 
after midnight the following morning. The first misfortune was 
the accidental discharge of two rifles and the flashes from a lan- 
tern, " which gave the enemy pretty timely notice of the march." 
General Wauchope arranged all the details of the advance, 
** The brigade was to march in mass of quarter columns, the four 
battalions keeping touch, and if necessary ropes were to be used 
312 



APPENDICES 313 

for the left guides ; these ropes were taken, but I believe, " adds 
Lord Methuen, "used by only two battalions. The three battal- 
ions were to extend just before daybreak, two companies in firing- 
line, two companies in support, and four companies in reserve, all 
at five paces' interval between them." Lord Methuen then gives 
an account of what actually happened — a tale infinitely sad. 

Not finding any signs of the enemy on the right flank just before 
daybreak, which took place at 4 a.m., as the brigade was approach- 
ing the foot of the kopje, Major-General Wauchope gave the order 
for the Black Watch to extend, but to direct its advance on the 
spur in front, the Seaforth Highlanders to prolong to the left, 
the Argyle and Sutherland Highlanders to prolong to the right, 
the Highland Light Infantry in reserve. Five minutes earlier 
(the kopje looming in the distance). Major Benson had asked 
Major-General Wauchope if he did not consider it to be time to 
deploy. Lieut. -Colonel Hughes-Hallett states that the extension 
could have taken place 200 yards sooner, but the leading battalion 
got thrown into confusion in the dark by a very thick bit of bush 
about 20 to 30 yards long. The Seaforth Highlanders went round 
this bush to the right, and had just got into its original position 
behind the Black Watch when the order to extend was given by 
Major-General Wauchope to the Black Watch. The Seaforth 
Highlanders and two companies of the Argyll and Sutherland 
Highlanders were also moving out, and were in the act of extend- 
ing when suddenly a heavy fire was poured in by the enemy, most 
of the bullets going over the men. 

" Lieut. -Colonel Hughes-Hallett at once ordered the Seaforths to 
fix bayonets and charge the position. The ofiicers commanding 
the other battalions acted in a similar manner. At this moment 
some one gave the word ' Retire. ' Part of the Black Watch then 
rushed back through the ranks of the Seaforths. Lieut. -Colonel 
Hallett ordered his men to halt and lie down, and not to retire. 
It was now becoming quite light, and some of the Black Watch 
were a little in front, to the left of the Seaforths." 

As soon as light permitted the artillery opened fire. The Sea- 
forths having had no orders, the commanding officer tried to reach 
the trenches, about 400 yards off, but as soon as the companies 
moved the officers and half the men fell before a very heavy fire. 
Ten minutes later another rush was tried, with the same fatal ill- 
success, and the fragment of the regiment lay down where they 



314 APPENDICES 

were. Meanwhile the 9th and 12th Lancers, G Battery, Royal 
Horse Artillery, and mounted infantry were working on the right 
fiank. At twelve o'clock noon the Gordons went forward to sup- 
port the Highland Brigade by order of I^ord Methuen, who adds 
that ' ' the trenches, even after the bombardment of lyddite and 
shrapnel since daybreak, were too strongly held to be cleared ; " 
but " the battalion did splendid work throughout the day." Con- 
tinuing the story from this point Lord Methuen states : 

" At I p.m. the Seaforth Highlanders found themselves exposed 
to a heavy crossfire, the enemy trying to get round to the right. 
The commanding officer brought his left forward. An order to 
* Retire ' was given, and it was at this time that the greater part of 
the casualties occurred. The retirement continued for 500 yards, 
and the ' Highlanders ' remained there till dusk. lyieut. -Colonel 
Downman, commanding Gordons, gave the order to retire, because 
he found his position untenable, so soon as the Seaforth Highland- 
ers made the turning movement to the right. This was an unfor- 
tunate retirement, for Lieut. -Colonel Hughes-Hallet had received 
instructions from me to remain in position until dusk, and the 
enemy were at this time quitting the trenches by tens and 
twenties. ' ' 

One paragraph is devoted to the gallant leader of the Highland 
Brigade, and the General sums up the failure : 

" Major-General Wauchope told me, when I asked him the ques- 
tion, on the evening of the loth, that he quite understood his 
orders, and made no further remark. He died at the head of the 
brigade, in which his name will always remain honoured and 
respected. His high military reputation and attainments disarm all 
criticism. Every soldier in my division deplores the loss of a 
fine soldier, and a true comrade. 

" The attack failed : the inclement weather was against success ; 
the men in the Highland Brigade were ready enough to rally, but 
the paucity of officers and non-commissioned officers rendered 
this no easy matter. I attach no blame to this splendid brigade. 
From noon until dark I held my own opposite to the enemy's 
intrenchments. ' ' 



APPENDIX X. 

SUMMARY OF IJVKNTS SINCE THE REI^IEF OF KIMBERIyKY. 

ThF general narrative of the campaign breaks off in the preced- 
ing chapters at various interesting points. Kimberley has been 
relieved, and the first step has been taken towards recovering the 
ground lost when lyord Methuen received his check at Maaghers- 
fontein. 

Not a moment was lost by Lord Roberts in pushing his advan- 
tage home. On the day following the Relief of Kimberley he 
pressed resolutely forward and occupied Jacobsdal, which is well 
within the Free State territory. His strategy was so well planned 
that the Boers under General Cronje, who had so stubbornly re- 
sisted the advance of Lord Methuen, precipitately fled from their 
trenches at Maaghersfontein, their places being taken by the 
British Guards. General French, with his cavalry, and Kelly- 
Kenny, with the Sixth Division, at once started in pursuit, and a 
general movement was developed by means of which Cronje's 
force was, on the 7th February, overtaken and completely sur- 
rounded at Paardeberg. 

The Boer General, with rare sagacity for one who was already 
in a hopeless position, established himself in the bed of the 
Modder River, and there intrenched himself within an area of one 
square mile, in the hope that reinforcements would come up either 
from Ladysmith or Cape Colony and rescue him from his pursuers. 
But his hope was vain. Lord Roberts commenced a terrific bom- 
bardment of his laager. It is said that no fewer than one hundred 
and ten guns were concentrated upon him and his unfortunate 
forces. 

Lord Roberts beat off comparatively small bodies of reinforce- 
ments which ventured into the neighbourhood, and on the 19th 
General Cronje, apparently realising the futility of further resist- 
ance, asked for an armistice. To this request Lord Kitchener gave 
the now historical reply, " Not a minute," and the bombardment 



3i6 APPENDICES 

was continued more furiously than ever. The British General's 
final defeat of the Boer reinforcements took place on the 20th. 
The indomitable Cronje still held out, however, and during the 
next seven days showed a tenacity of purpose which marks him 
as one of the most stubborn soldiers who ever lived. 

On the 27th he abandoned his last hope, and, by a happy chance 
on the anniversary of Majuba Day, surrendered to Lord Roberts 
with over four thousand officers and men. 

The news, as may be imagined, was received in Great Britain 
and throughout the Empire with the wildest enthusiasm, especially 
on account of the fact that the chief honours of the final rush 
which settled Cronje's fate were shared with the Gordon High- 
landers by the Canadians. 

General Cronje was sent as a prisoner to Capetown, in charge of 
General Pretyman, and Roberts continued his march on the 
Orange capital. On Tuesday, March 13th, the first part of the 
.campaign from Cape Colony was brought to a glorious conclusion, 
Lord Roberts being able on the evening of that day, in a dispatch 
which will long be memorable, to telegraph to his Government : — 

" By the help of God and by the bravery of her Majesty's sol- 
diers, the troops under my command have taken possession of 
Bloemfontein. 

'' The British flag now flies over the Presidency, vacated last 
evening by Mr. Steyn, late President of the Orange Free State." 

Meanwhile great events were happening in Natal. The main 
narrative closed with the failure of General Buller's third attempt 
to relieve Ladysmith. That was on February 7th. It was not 
until the 20th that a further effort was made, and General Hart 
crossed the Tugela and occupied Colenso. Even then it seemed 
impossible for the gallant British troops to make headway, for 
General Buller himself was on the south of the Tugela six days 
later. Majuba Day, however, brought luck to Buller as it had 
done to Roberts. Pieter's Hill was stormed and the Boers' main 
position was carried. Buller had fought for four days and had 
sustained severe losses throughout. The renowned Inniskillings 
were almost destroyed. Buller reported afterwards, however, that 
the victory he had gained far exceeded his expectations. 

The road was at last cleared to Ladysmith. Lord Dundonald, at 
the head of his cavalry, which had done such splendid service be- 
fore the battle of Spion Kop, succeeded in penetrating through the 



APPENDICES 317 

intervening country, and actually entered the beleaguered town on 
February 28th. The formal entry of General Buller into Lady- 
smith occurred three days later, and thus the long siege, which had 
lasted from November 2nd, was triumphantly brought to an end. 

It should not be overlooked that, ever since we had any news 
from Ladysmith at all, we had had nothing but the most cheerful 
reports declaring the garrison to be in the best of spirits, and to 
be well provided with food and ammunition. The world now 
learned that they had undergone unheard-of privations, that the 
whole camp was a hospital, that the artillery ammunition was 
practically exhausted, and that both the military and the civil 
population were reduced to the last extremity. It was, indeed, a 
community of living skeletons which greeted its deliverer. 

Again, as when Kimberley was relieved and when Cronje sur- 
rendered, there was unbounded rejoicing among Britons all over 
the world. 

A few lines are necessary to summarise one branch of the cam- 
paign which has not yet been noticed — the campaign along the 
Orange River in the north and north-east of Cape Colony. 

General Gatacre, with the Third Division, which had been 
broken off from the original Army Corps and had now become a 
rather weak and confused independent force, was sent to stem the 
tide of Boer invasion, and to check, if possible, the spreading 
spirit of revolt among the Cape Dutch. It was obvious from the 
first that he had an arduous task before him. After the battle of 
Elandslaagte, in Natal, General French was sent round to his as- 
sistance, and speedily, with his cavalry, made a strong impression 
upon the enemy. He could not, however, effect much beyond re- 
connaissances, and even these did not save General Gatacre from 
a severe reverse when, in attacking Stormberg on December loth, 
he was misled by his guides into what was practically an ambus- 
cade and lost hundreds of his men. Since that date General Gatacre 
has done but little. The operations of lyord Roberts on the Mod- 
der River and of Buller on the Tugela has at length, however, 
relieved the pressure in the Stormberg region and enabled Gatacre 
with his whole force to cross the Orange River and occupy Bethu- 
lie. His field of action is thus transferred to the Orange Free 
State, where he will doubtless co-operate with Roberts. 

There are still two minor operations to be noticed, the peculiar 
circumstances of which have caused them to arouse an enormous 



3i8 APPENDICES 

amount of public interest. The first is the gallant stand which 
Colonel Plumer with a mere handful of men has made on the 
Transvaal-Rhodesia frontier. He has not only prevented the 
Boers from invading Rhodesia, but he has been able to clear them 
out of the surrounding country and to make a memorable march 
southward. 

The object of his march was to relieve a garrison which may be 
said to have supplied the most romantic episode of the war. At 
Mafeking, the frontier village from which Dr. Jameson started on 
his famous raid, Colonel Baden-Powell was beleaguered by a large 
Boer force, which was at first under command of the redoubtable 
Cronje. 

The actual investment took place about the middle of October, 
and there is no authentic news that it is ended even yet. It is im- 
possible to exaggerate the admiration which has been felt for the 
little garrison, whose real sufferings will probably be found to have 
eclipsed even those of Ladysmith, and who may well repeat on 
their own behalf Sir George White's proud boast "that at all 
events he had kept the British flag flying." 



INDEX. 



Afrikander Bond, the sym- 
pathy of with the Transvaal, 

30- 

Alexandersfontein, Boers routed 
and their laager seized at, 
264. 

Ambulance : 

Fired on by B9ers, 154. 
Stretcher - bearers ' bravery, 
223. 

Army Service Corps, organisa- 
tion of, lOI. 

Basuto Land, the Switzerland 

of South Africa, 2. 
Baden-Powell, Colonel, splendid 
defence of Maf eking by , 318. 
Battles : 

Alexandersfontein, at, 264. 

Belmont, at, 129. 

Colenso, of, 92. 

Klandslaagte, of, 84. 

Glencoe, of, 82. 

Graspan, or Enslin, 141. 

Horrors of, to be seen outside 
the range of fire, 223. 

Kimberley, outside, 271. 

Laing's Nek, 20. 



Battles {continued) — 

Maaghersfontein, of, 93, 174. 
Majuba Hill, 20. 
Nicholson's Nek, 39, 88. 
Pieter's Hill, 316. 
Rietfontein, at, 86. 
Scenes and sounds of modem, 

219. 
Spion Kop, of, 95. 
Stormberg, 93, 317. 
Traits of modern, 212. 
Waggon Hill, of, 94. 
Belmont battle, description of, 

130. 
Bloemfontein : 

Capital of the Orange Free 

State, 5. 
Captured by Andries Pre- 

torius, 16. 
Taken by I^ords Roberts, 316. 
Boers, the : 

Anecdotes about, 202. 
As slave-drivers, 10. 
At home, 61. 

Boastful because of their vic- 
tories, 22. 
Camps : 
I Adjuncts of, 136. 

19 



320 



INDEX 



Boers, the {continued) — 

At the beginning of the war, 

38. 

Cannot be compared to the 
founders of the North Amer- 
ican Republic, 12. 

Character of, 7. 

Characteristic aims of, 9. 

Combination of Dutch and 
French Huguenots, a, 8. 

Costume worn by when fight- 
ing, 138. 

Disastrous effect of foreign 
agencies among, 6. 

Double dealing of, 266. 

Drive to battle in carriages, 

138. 
Bndeavour of to shake off the 

British yoke, 15. 
Establishment of the Repub- 
lics by, 14. 
Generals of : 

Botha, Commandant, 272. 

Cronje, 166, 315. 

Joubert, General, 81. 

Meyer, Lucas, 81. 

Viljoen, 81. 
Gin, extensively used by, 161. 
"Great Trek" made in 1836 

by, 13- 
Horses of, found on Modder 

River Battle-field, 163. 
Ignorance of, 66. 
Independence of, 62. 
Intermarriage of, 62. 
Methods of fighting, 135. 
Native territories invaded by, 

24. 
Open letter to a Field-Comet 

by Julian Ralph, 249. 



Boers, the {continued) — 
Participants in the "Great 

Trek," 15. 
Places of danger in the battles 

forced on subordinates by, 

137- 
Reason of the British defeat 

at Majuba Hill by, 21. 
Republican com munities 

among, 15. 
Retrogression of, 23. 
Revolt of the Transvaal Boers, 

20. 
Ride to the Front on inferior 

horses, leaving their best 

chargers to retreat with, 

138. 
Rude graves made by on the 

battle-field, 162. 
Seldom seen in battle, 232. 
10,000 of them journey North 

and Kast in 1838, 13. 
Treatment of : 

Natives by, 11. 

The Refugees by, 70. 
Trenches of, impregnable, 

232. 
Ultimatum issued by, 36. 
Wonderful trenches of, 160. 
Wretched condition of the 

fighting, 136. 
Brakfontein Range, Movement 

of Buller on the, 95, 
British Army. 

In South Africa at the out- 
break of the War, 37. 
Officers of : 

Characteristics of, 55. 

Splendid qualities of the, 57. 
Using mud to colour their 



INDEX 



321 



British Army {continued)— 
white straps, drums, &c., 
125. 
British Casualties : 
Colenso, at, 93. 
Elandslaagte, at, 86. 
Glencoe, at, 83. 
Graspan, at, 146. 
Modder River Battle, at, 156. 
Rietfontein, at, 87. 
British Generals : 
Babbington, General, 261. 
BuUer, Sir Redvers, 38, 316. 
Clery, Sir Francis, 38, 94. 
Colville, General, 261. 
Dundonald, Lord, 94, 316. 
French, General, 84, 315. 
Gatacre, Sir William, 38, 91. 
Hart, General, 316. 
Hildyard, General, 92. 
Kelly-Kenny, General, 315. 
Kitchener, Lord, 93. 
Lyttelton, General, 95. 
Macdonald, Sir Hector, 261. 
Methuen, Lord, 38, 91. 
Pole-Carew, Brigadier-Gen- 
eral, 149, 165, 261. 
Roberts, Field-Marshal Lord, 

41, 93, 260. 
Symons, Sir William Penn, 

81. 
Walker, Sir Forestier, 54. 
Warren, Sir Charles, 94, 95. 
Wauchope, General, 179. 
White, Sir George, 80. 
Wood, Major-General, 105, 

308. 
Yule, General, 83. 
British Government slow to 
realise the task before it, 38. 



British ojSacers : 

Baden-Powell, Colonel, 318. 

Barter, Colonel, 133, 155, 169. 

Bond, Captain, 155. 

Carleton, Colonel, 88. 

Douglas, Colonel, 261. 

Gough, Colonel, the Hon. G. 
H., 108. 

Hall, Major, 116. 

Hamilton, Colonel, 85. 

Keith-Falconer, Lieut. -Colo- 
nel, 119. 

Kekewich, Colonel, 267. 

Lindley, Major, 145. 

Macbean, Colonel, 250. 

Mackenzie, Captain, 99. 

May, Captain, 272. 

Mess of the Wessex Fusiliers, 
192. 

Money, Colonel, 112. 

O'Meara, Major W. A. T., 
269. 

Plumer, Colonel, 318. 

Reason why the Boers can 
single them out, 119. 

Rimington, Major, 127. 

Scott-Turner, Colonel, 269- 

273- 
The flower of England's aris- 
tocracy, 55. 
Webster, Lieutenant, 268. 
Wood, Captain, 119. 
British reply to the Boer Ulti- 
matum, 37. 
British transports ordered to 

Durham, 91. 
British troops : 

Despatched in force after Oct. 

3i» 1899, 39. 
Moved nearer the frontiers of 



322 



INDEX 



British troops {continued) — 
the Free State and Trans- 
vaal, 37. 

Movements of from Capetown 
kept secret, 48. 

150,000 men sent out, 41. 

Reinforced bj' calls on the 
Volunteers and Yeomanry, 
40. 
Buller, General Sir Redvers : 

Army Corps under, 38. 

Determination of to relieve 
Ladysmith, 91. . 

Successful in relieving Lady- 
smith, 317. 

Camps, Boer : 

Harrismith, at, 38. 

Sandspruit, at, 38. 

Volksrust, at, 38. 
Cape Colony : 

Bnglish first spoken in the 
law courts of, 10. 

Bnglish took possession in 

1795 of, 9- 

Population of, 4. 

Size of, 4 
Capetown : 

Contrasts between British sol- 
diers and refugees in, 60. 

Free and easy manners in, 

45. 
Headquarters of the British 

army, 46. 
Idlers and millionaires in, 68. 
Millionaires at the hotels of, 

71. 

Railway station of, excite- 
ment at the, 47. 

Refugees in, 43. 



Capetown [continued] — 
Relief work for refugees in, 

71, 72. 
Rich refugees in, mean char- 
acteristics of, 58. 
Shops of, 45. 

Slender variety of food in, 46. 
Transfigured by the war, 43. 
Variety of nationalities to be 

found in, 44. 
Vehicles of, 44. 
Chieveley, destruction of a Brit- 
ish armoured train near, 92. 
Christmas : 

At Kimberley, 274. 
Celebrated in Methuen's 

camp, 208. 
Cheering the Queen in camp 

at, 210. 
With Methuen's army, 204. 
Climatic changes in South 

Africa, 74. 
Coldstream Guards the first to 
cross the Modder River, 
164, 165. 
Colenso, British troops at, 80. 
Colesberg, abandonment of by 

the British, 105. 
Colonial contingents furnished 

by British Colonies, 39. 
Convention of 1884, terms of 

the, 25. 
Cronje, Commandant : 
Asks for an armistice, 315, 
Flies to Paardeberg, 315. 
Sent as prisoner to Capetown, 

316. 
Surrenders on Majuba Day, 

316. 



INDEX 



323 



Cronje, Commandant {co7t- 
tinued) — 
Surrounded by Lord Roberts' 
armj^ 315. 

DE Aar : 

British headquarters at, 100. 
Fortifications of, 106. 
In November, 1899, 97. 
Manners at headquarters at, 

99- 
Martial Law proclaimed in, 

106. 
Natives at, 102. 
Perilous position of, 105, 
Rapid growth of, 103, 
Remount kraal at, 100. 
Situation at, 104. 
De Beers Company's liberality 

in provisioning Kimberley, 

269. 
Diamond mines at Kimberley, 

3- 

Dundee, Boers march on, 81. 

Dundonald, Lord, enters Lady- 
smith, 316. 

Dust and khaki, the effect of, 
122. 

Dutch in South Africa. The 
Historical Foreword, i. 



Ei<andsi<aagte; : 
Battle of, 84. 
British troops at, 80. 
Occupied by Boers, 81, 
Emancipation Act passed in 

England in 1834, 10. 
Enslin or Graspan, description 
of the battle of, 141. 



I Failure of Bnller's : 

First attempt to relieve Lady- 
smith, 93. 

Second attempt to relieve 
Ladysmith, 94. 

Third attempt to relieve 
Ladysmith, 95. 

Franchise discussed by Kruger 

and Sir Alfred Milner, 3. 
French, General : 

Cavalry move forward under, 
262. 

First action by, 84. 

Move of to join Lord Roberts, 
260. 

Relief of Kimberley by, 264. 

Starts in pursuit of Cronje, 

315. 
Frere, British camp at, 92, 
Fresh appointments by the 

British Government, 93. 
Fusillade kept up by the Boers 

at Modder River battle, 152. 

GaTacre, General, movements 

of, 317- 
Glencoe : 
Battle of, 82. 
British troops at, 80. 
Junction occupied by Boers, 
81. 
Gold: 
Discovered at Witwatersrand 

in 1885, 26. 
In the Transvaal, 3. 
Gough, Colonel, forces under 

at Belmont, 115. 
Griqualand formed, 1869, 18, 



324 



INDEX 



Guards, The : 
Belmont, at, 131. 
Modder River, at, 150-152. 

Harbours : 
Beira, 2. 
Capetown, 2. 
Delagoa Bay, 2. 
Durban, 2. 
Saldanha Bay, 2. 
Walfish Bay, 2. 
Heliographic communication 
opened with Ladysmith, 94. 
Highland Brigade at Maaghers- 
fontein, the : 
Charge of, 179. 
Losses of, 190. 
Their own explanation, 190. 
True story of, 186. 
Hildyard, General, successful 
action at Willow Grange 
by, 92. 
Honey Nest Kloof, watering- 
place at, 147. 
Hotel with mud walls on an 
island in the Modder River, 
214. 

Jacobsdai, : 

Mounted infantry moving to, 

263. 
Occupied by Lord Roberts, 

264. 
Stores of food and ammuni- 
tion seized by the British 
at, 265. 
Jameson Raid, objects of the, 

29. 
Johannesbmrg, a German opin- 
ion of , 73. 



KlAi^FiRS, the, generous treat- 
ment of by the British, 79. 
Karroo Desert, the, description 

of, 75- 
Keith-Falconer, Lieut. -Colonel, 

death of, 119. 
Kekewich, Colonel, forces 
under his command at 
Kimberley, 267. 
Khaki, the advantages of, 124. 
Kimberley : 

British force in, 38. 
Christmas at, in 1899, 274. 
Claims of ownership when 
diamonds were found at, 17. 
Diamond mines of, 3. 
Food prices fixed at, 270. 
Gun manufactured at the 
DeBeers' workshop in, 274, 
French relieves, 264. 
Martial law proclaimed in, 268. 
Record of the siege of, 267. 
Search-lights at, 271. 
Siege of raised, 275. 
Sorties from, 271-273. 
Kitchener, Lord : 
Appointed Chief of the Staff, 

93- 
Reply of to Cronje's request 

for an armistice, 315. 
Klip Drift, French crosses the 

Modder at, 263. 
Kruger, President : 
Correspondence of with Sir 

Alfred Milner, 29. 
Speech of on England's High 

Commissioners at the Cape, 

51. 
Story of after his visit to 
London, 66. 



INDEX 



325 



Ladysmi^Th : 

British troops at, 80. 
Invested by the Boers, 87. 
Privations of, 317. 
Relieved on February 28th, 

317- 
Sir George White at, 83. 
Straits of the garrison of, 

94. 
Letter to a Field-Cornet from 
Julian Ralph, 249-259. 

MaagheRS^onTEin : 
British forces at, 176. 
Description of the battle of, 
174. 
Macdonald, General Sir Hector, 
Chief of the Highland Bri- 
gade, 261. 
Maf eking : 

British force in, 38. 
The defence of, 318. 
Manica Land, beautiful scenery 

of, 2. 
Matjesfontein, description of 
Mr. J. D. Logan's property 
at, 77. 
Mess, the : 

Kitchen of the Yorkshire 
Light Infantry, description 
of, 206. 
Luncheon to the accompani- 
ment of shells, 216. 
Of the Wessex Fusiliers, inci- 
dents at, 192. 
Methuen's army : 

And the halt after Maaghers- 

fontein, 228. 
Start for the relief of Kimber- 
ley, 91. 



Milner, Sir Alfred : 

American opinion of, 51. 

Correspondence of with 
Kruger, 29. 

Great capacities of, 53. 

Representations made by in 
1899 to Kruger, 31. 

Trials of, 49. 
Modder River : 

Battle, description of, 149. 

Battle-field, description of, 158 

Camp, the long wait at, 212. . 
Modern War Methods, 228. 
Mules and horses purchased, 

100. 

NAAUwrooRT, abandonment of 

by the British, 105. 
Natal. 
Boer : 
Invasion of on October 12, 

1899, 81. 
Republic for six years only, 
a, 15. 
British force in, 38. 
Buller's arrival in, 91. 
Invaded by the Boers first in 

1838, 14. 
Population of, 4. 
Size of, 4, 5. 
Naval Brigade at Graspan, gal- 
lantry of the, 144. 
Newcastle occupied by the 

Boers, 81. 
Nicholson's Nek Disaster, re- 
sponsibility of, claimed by 
Sir G. White, 90. 

Orangk Frkk Statk, The : 
Boers of superior to those of 
the Transvaal, 18. 



326 



INDEX 



Orange Free State, the {coti- 
tinued) — 
Claimed ^^90,000 for Kimber- 

ley, 18. 
Independence granted to in 

1854, 17. 
Population of, 5. 
Size of, 5. 
Orange River Camp, headquar- 
ters at during a battle, 109. 
Ostrich in camp, an, 117. 

Padrk H11.1., courage of, at 

Belmont, 199. 
Padre Robertson : 
In the Boer lines, 200. 
Pluck of, 199. 
Plumer, Colonel, work done by 

the column under, 318. 
Pole-Carew, Brigadier-General, 
given the command of the 
Guards Brigade, 261. 
Petitions signed by Uitlanders, 

26-28. 
Pietermaritzburg : 
British troops at, 80. 
Established by the Boers, 14. 
Pretorius, Andries, rising under, 
16. 

QuBENSTowN, Gatacre's force 
at, 91. 

Ramdam, Roberts' army at, 263. 
Refugees from the Transvaal, 

treatment of by the Boers, 

70. 
Retief , Pieter, invasion of Natal 

by, 14. 
Rhodes, Cecil : 

At Kimberley, 268. 



Rhodes, Cecil {continued) — 
To the rescue in the matter of 

Christmas fare, 274. 
Rimington's Scouts, contrasts 

in, 128. 
Rivers in South Africa : 
Buffalo, the, 81. 
Klip, 87. 

Modder, the, 147, 264, 315. 
Orange River, the, 104. 
Riet, the, 263. 
Tugela, the, 81. 
Roberts, Field-Marshal lyord : 
Army moving forward under, 

262. 
Bombardment of Cronje's 

laager by, 315. 
Commander-in-Chief in South 

Africa, 93. 
Cronje and his army surren- 
ders to, 316. 
Move of into the Free State, 

262. 
Supreme command accepted 

by, 41. 
Takes possession of Bloemfon- 

tein, 316. 
Visit of to De Aar, 260. 
Roberts, Lieutenant the Hon, 

Frederick, news of his death 

at Colenso, 41. 
Rouliot, M., President of the 

Chamber of Mines at Johan- 
nesburg, 27. 

Sand River Convention of 1852, 
terms of the, 16, 

Scenes of modern war, descrip- 
tion of, 220. 

Sensations when wounded, 225. 



INDEX 



327 



Smith, Sir Harry, facts about, 16. 
Smokeless powder, the effects 

of, 233. 
Soldiers : 
Going to the Front from Cape- 
town, 47, 
Peculiarities of soldier serv- 
ants, 205. 
South Africa : 

Cities of, two only of any 

size, 3. 
Divisions of : 
Cape Colony, 4. 
Natal, 4. 

Orange Free State, 4. 
The Transvaal, 4. 
Dust of, the, 122. 
Dutch settled in 1652 in, 8. 
Elevation of English and 

Dutch domains, 
French Huguenots settled in 

1689 in, 8. 
Harbours of, 2. 
November climate of, 74. 
Pasturage of, 3. 
Physical geography of, i, 2. 
Sameness of scenery in, 2. 
Sparsely inhabited, 3. 
Temperature of, 3. 
Stellenbosch, a supply base for 

the British, 98. 
Steyn, President, flees from his 

capital, 316. 
Summary of events since the 

relief of Kimberley, 315. 
Symons, Sir W. Penn, death of, 
82. 

Tai^ana Hill, Boer position on, 
82. 



' ' Tommies ' ' : 
Anxious for the officers to 

dress like themselves, 127. 
No depredations on Boer 

property by the, 264. 
Of conspicuous gallantry : 

Bennett, Lance - Corporal, 
184. 

Cassen, Sergeant, 184. 

Mawhood, Private, 184. 
Water-bottles, the filling of 

the, 167. 
Transvaal, the : 

Aliens Expulsion Act in, 27. 
Boer : 

Home in, 64. 

Wars with the natives, 19. 
Established as a semi-inde- 
pendent State in 1881, 21. 
Foreign parasites of the Boers 

spread discontent, 6. 
Gold in, 3. 
Greater independence gained 

in 1884 by a new treaty, 

24. 
Growth of the revenue of, 

26. 
Mistake by the English in the 

government of, 20. 
Pasture land of, 5. 
Population of, 5. 
Size of, 5. 
Terms of naturalisation fixed 

by, 29. 
Treaty made by Gladstone in 

1881 with, 21. 
War: 

Declared against England, 
October 9, 1899, 35. 

Munitions amassed by, 35. 



328 



INDEX 



Tugela, the : 

Bridges over destroyed by the 

Boers, 92. 
Recrossed by Buller, 94-95. 

UiTi^ANDERS, the : 
Grievances of, 26-29. 
National Union formed by in 
1892, 28. 

VoivUNTKERS : 

City of lyondon Imperials 

raised, 40, 94. 
Colonial, 40, 94. 

Wai^ker, Sir F'orestier, facts 

about, 54. 
War correspondents : 

Knight, E. F., 133. 

Knox, Mr., 153. 

Under fire, incidents of, 236- 
48. 
Wright, Captain, iii. 
Warren, Sir Charles, division 

under, 94. 



Water : 

Scarcity of after Graspan, 172. 
The delights of after fighting 

and marching, 147, 
The value of on Methuen's 
march, 167. 
Waterboer declared owner of 

Kimberley, 18. 
Waterfall Drift, French crosses 

the Riet River at, 263. 
White, Sir George : 

Arrival of at Durban in Oc- 
tober, 80. 
Disposal of his forces by, 81. 
Effort of to harass the enemy 
at Ivady smith, 88. 
White people, the scarcity of, 

except in Natal, i. 
Witwatersrand, gold discovered 
in 1885 at, 26. 

Yorkshires at Maaghersfon- 

tein, the, 183. 
Yule, General, joining hands 

with Sir George White, 86. 



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